


Blood Moon, Dry County

by PumpkinDoodles



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: 1920s New Mexico, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Bootleggers, F/M, Flapper AU, Jane Foster & Darcy Lewis Friendship, Prohibition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-12
Packaged: 2019-12-31 23:01:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18323729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PumpkinDoodles/pseuds/PumpkinDoodles
Summary: Darcy Lewis and Jane Foster discover that Prohibition-era New Mexico is no place to study the stars.





	1. The New Woman

It was too warm in this party, Darcy Lewis thought desperately. There were so many people here to celebrate her cousin Jane’s success as a liberated New Woman that the Virginia night air was not circulating, even with all the windows and doors open. It was Jane Foster’s debut as the foremost female scientific mind of 1925. Jane had been awarded money to go to New Mexico, of all places, by the Stark family of industrialists. The current head of the family, Tony Stark, had a fund to encourage female education and full participation in public life, named after his mother. He had also sponsored successful string of ladies’ sporting events: automotive racing, tennis, golf. Their friend Sharon Carter was the current ladies’s national tennis champion. It was really a pity that Darcy had no swing. She had to content herself with playing second-fiddle to Jane. She was to be Jane’s assistant in Puente Antiguo, just to have–in her mother’s words– “something useful to do with yourself, since you aren’t married or a female genius.” Those seemed to be her only two options: be extraordinary or mind-numbingly ordinary. 

Darcy stood up to walk around. Women in short dresses and wide pants were lingering in the windowsills, smoking, while young men with nervous faces offered opinions and took them back again. She could smell cigarette smoke, brilliantine, and Mitsouko. Catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror above the fireplace, Darcy frowned. Her newly-bobbed hair had gone frizzy and she looked too warm. How she envied Jane her cool elegance and smooth bob! She put down her glass and moved through the crowd of well-wishers. Jane was fending off a blonde Kappa Alpha with a smile like a toothpaste advertisement and rolled her eyes at Darcy. She shook her head. It really was a pity that Jane was the beautiful one, she thought. Jane had no use for beauty whatsoever and Darcy could have used it to great effect. All her life she’d been told she should have been born a decade or two earlier and made a fine-looking Gibson Girl. But she was resolutely out of fashion.

Darcy escaped the house and wandered out into the gardens. She sat on one of the benches and listened to the sounds of laughter, music, and drinking. She had been outside for twenty minutes, when something white appeared to be crossing the lawn. The figure of Sharon Carter emerged in the moonlight. 

“Hullo, Shar,” Darcy said.

“Have you escaped the wolves?” Sharon said. “Please tell me you have a flask?”

“Fraid not,” Darcy said. She didn’t even smoke. Her only vices were lip rouge and a weakness for taffy candy. 

“Never mind, I do,” Sharon said, fishing under her skirt. “Here, have a drink.”

“Thank you.” Darcy swigged the silver vial. It burned on the way down. She coughed a little.

“Nervous?” Sharon said.

“Yes,” Darcy admitted.

“We all are,” Sharon said. “When you stop being utterly terrified, you’re dead.”

“I thought that was just Jane’s driving?” Darcy said, hiccupping slightly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun notes about Prohibition: http://prohibition.themobmuseum.org/the-history/the-prohibition-underworld/bootleggers-and-bathtub-gin/


	2. The Wettest County In All of New Mexico

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing!

“It’s so….dry,” Darcy said, peering out of the train window at the New Mexico landscape as the train shuddered to a stop at the Puente Antiguo station. Everything was brown and brown and brown. Jane was still glued to her book. Behind them, a man started to laugh. Darcy turned curiously and looked at him.

“Not dry here, ladies. The wettest county in all of New Mexico,” he said, laughing, as he shouldered his suitcase away.

“Was he being literal or does he mean hooch?” Darcy said to Jane. “Jane!”

“Hmmm?” Jane said, looking up. She blinked. “Are we here?” she asked.

“Yes,” Darcy said, grinning. “You’d end up at the end of the line if I wasn’t with you, wouldn’t you?”

“This is a very good book,” Jane said. “All about the movement of the stars in the cosmos, although Fields gets the science all wrong…”

Darcy listened to Jane talk as they got their bags and walked to their boarding house. It was a dusty, one street sort of town. She spotted a drugstore, a movie theater, and a gas station. The attendant stood under an awning, smoking. He watched them as they walked by, eyes trailing Jane. She was too busy talking about constellations to notice. Darcy peered around. The side streets were dotted with wooden houses, bleached grey in the sun or painted white. It was so hot, she didn’t even see any dogs out walking. Beads of perspiration formed on Darcy’s neck and slipped down her back. She was going to need talcum powder. “That must be the barber shop,” she said to Jane, catching sight of a building with several men lingering outside. The men stared at them. Or Jane, Darcy thought, doing a quick survey and then looking away. Some men took a direct gaze as an invitation to get fresh, she’d realized. It was worse now that she’d bobbed her hair. They assumed she was fast. But she’d done it in anticipation of the new climate, thinking her hair’d be easier to care for. Also, in the hope that it would make her feel stylish. Instead, her curly hair puffed out sideways. Darcy had taken to tying it back with a scarf, purely out of irritation. Jane had absent-mindedly told her it made her look like a brunette Clara Bow, but Jane was just being nice, really.

“Selvig’s is supposed to be near the barber shop,” Jane said.

“Yup,” Darcy said. She felt eyes on them and looked sideways. There were six men standing around the barbershop porch. Not farmers, she realized. Their clothes were too clean and fashionable. A farmer didn’t wear flashy pocket squares. Odd in a town like this. You couldn’t get those suits here. One of them turned to stare at her. Darcy immediately looked away, but not before she caught a glimpse of a tanned face, dark eyes, and an unshaven jaw. He looked at her suspiciously.

“What is it?” Jane whispered.

“The man on the train said this was the wettest county in the state,” Darcy said.

“But it’s not,” Jane said. “What man?”

“It is if he didn’t mean rain,” Darcy said, shifting her eyes significantly. Jane nodded, glanced back, and immediately turned her head back.

“We’ll stay out of their way,” she said. “They’ll stay out of ours.”

Their new landlady, Mrs. Selvig, had come via a recommendation of Jane’s father’s. He’d written a hasty letter from Europe. Also, a scientific genius, he was busy organizing exhibits at a London museum. He and Mrs. Foster were to live abroad for the next several years. “There it is,” Darcy said, pointing to a faded sign on the house. It was down the street just across from the barbershop. It was an odd-looking house, with a commercial garage for cars, and the whole building was painted a strange rusty red, and had been added on to willy-nilly. They walked up on the porch. Jane knocked sharply. “Mrs. Selvig!” she called.

“Yeah?” a deep voice called from somewhere above. They looked at each other. Jane stepped off the porch and looked up.

“I’m Jane Foster!” she said at the voice.

“Edward’s daughter,” the voice said pleasantly. Darcy thought Jane’s expression turned pale for a second. She decided to join her. Darcy was curious by nature. She looked up. There was a large man standing on the roof above them, peering down. “I’m your new landlord,” he said. “Erik Selvig. Be right down.” Then he disappeared.

“Was he in his underclothes on the roof?” Darcy said, tilting her head.

“Yes,” Jane said. “He was. Drat! My father wrote Erik Selvig. Curse his penmanship!”

“Is that where you get it from?” Darcy teased.

Once they’d settled in, Darcy was delighted to find that there was a small, battered radio in her room. “I wish we could have brought the phonograph,” she said to Jane with a sigh. “And my records.” Jane’s room adjoined hers. There was actually a door between them. She thought her narrow room might’ve once been a hallway, but she was fine with it. She and Jane could talk at night.

“Too heavy,” Jane said. Darcy fiddled with the radio and then opened a window. The radio programme was playing “Tin Roof Blues.”

Darcy sat on the windowsill and listened to the music. “It’ll never rain here, will it?” she called.

“Probably not,” Jane said. “I don’t expect any rain will fall on us for the whole three months.”

“Nope,” Darcy said. The sounds of jazz drifted out into the night. She couldn’t imagine a place less like Virginia. Unless you counted the surface of the moon. The moon and the stars were uncommonly clear out, though. She tilted her head to peer up at them.  
  
“Nothing at all will fall,” she whispered to herself.

 

She had fallen asleep to the sound of music on the radio and the noises from the open window and dreamed of Virginia gardens. Darcy didn’t hear the news bulletin as it drifted through the room: 

_Two federal Prohibition agents are believed to have been shot dead by bootleggers in the desert outside Puente Antiguo, New Mexico. Agent Joseph Lee leaves behind a widow and three children, while Agent Homer Corey leaves behind a widow and five children. Their funerals will be held in Albuquerque later this month. Tomorrow night, the Reverend Edwin Creighton Tillis is preaching a sermon on rebellion at home and lawlessness in public in Las Cruces:_

_“These wayward women, these bobbed-haired girls, they rebel against the natural authority of the father and mother at home. Rebellion is sin against God. Rebellion is the root, the source of all the lawlessness and crime that plagues America today…”_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want to see the mood boards for these, hop over to my tumblr: https://yespumpkindoodlesthings.tumblr.com/post/183852003383/because-i-cant-not-goof-around-with-this-flapper


	3. Wet Weather

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos! Y'all are amazing.

In the morning, Darcy woke to bright sunshine streaming into her eyes and the radio blaring. “Oof,” she said, getting up to silence the radio. She had a headache. Running into the edge of the unfamiliar bed frame, she swore.

“What’s wrong?” Jane called from the adjacent room.

“Headache!” Darcy called.

“You’ve got travel sickness, probably. The change in altitude and climate,” Jane said, appearing at the door. “Dad swears on drinking local water wherever he goes. Go down to the drugstore after breakfast, get a fountain drink from the druggist. That’s what he tells me.”

“Okay,” Darcy said, “but aren’t we working today?”

“Not yet, Erik’s helping me with an instrument build today,” Jane said. Erik was a talented builder as well as a trained scientist; he’d explained at dinner that his primary local income came from repairing cars and other equipment, but he wanted to make more important contributions to the science of the cosmos. It was really a pity, Jane had whispered to Darcy, that he’d had a small incident with a nervous condition. It was why he’d moved west and isolated himself in this town, hoping to find some peace and study the stars.

“Wonderful idea,” Darcy said, thankful that Jane would have someone to talk science to besides herself.

“You could go see a picture, too?” Jane offered.

“Oooh,” Darcy said. “I wonder if they’ve got that new Valentino?” She hadn’t seen _A Sainted Devil_ yet. “But I’ll check the typewriter first,” she said, a little sadly. Jane deemed typewriters essential, but not music. Darcy liked to tease it was because Jane was tone-deaf and didn’t like to dance.

 

She also helped Erik with breakfast, but there was a tinge of self-interest. He preferred his toast more well-done than Jane and she, Darcy gathered. Jane was talking about doing outdoor observation at night when Erik looked troubled. “You’ll need to be careful, Jane.”

“Careful how?” Darcy said.

“Bootleggers have set up stills out in the desert,” he explained, standing up to get some butter. “They can be territorial. Whole town’s been bribed to ignore it, so it’s best to stay out of their way.”

“Erik,” Jane said, mightily trying to ignore the fact that Erik seemed to go about in half-undress. “Is this a bad county for bootlegging?” He nodded.

“Very bad,” he said. “The bootleggers own Puente Antiguo. They’re out of towners. I’ve heard talk that they came from Chicago.” Jane nodded. Chicago and New York were the worst cities for crime and liquor-related violence now.

“They have stills in the desert?” Darcy said. “Isn’t that a poor location? The alcohol doesn’t evaporate? What?” Darcy said, catching Jane’s expression, “that seems like a sensible question to me.” Erik grinned.

“I’d say it is. There was a rancher. McPherson. He sold his cattle ranch to Rumlow and his men. They use that land--according to local wags--to make their own liquor and, shall we say, import good liquor from Mexico. All very cleverly done, I’m told. It gets sold in California,” Erik said. “Before it evaporates. I believe McPherson put in some refrigeration for his dairy.”

“And they make a profit?” Darcy said. “Even if they’re so far away and have to move it?”

“All richer than sin. The drys can legislate all they like from Washington. The thing you ought to know,” Erik said slowly, “is that the American West floats on a sea of alcohol. It’ll never be dry.”

Darcy thought it was a pretty metaphor to describe the particular dilemma of Puente Antiguo: hard drinkers, wide open landscape, determined criminals, and little to no law enforcement. She and Jane promised Erik they’d keep their heads down. He told them that there were rumors that the "Prohis"--the Prohibition agents--had been shot by someone local. But no one was saying. It could be the Chicagoans, but it could also have been a local caught with a home still or a car full of hooch.

 

 

She walked down to the main street after breakfast and typing some of Jane’s notes. There was a dark car, a new Ford, parked in front of the drugstore. Darcy glanced at it curiously, then realized there was someone inside. The dark-haired man from the barbershop. One of the bootleggers. His eyes didn’t seem to register her as she walked in. There was an open newspaper in his lap. _Good. He wasn’t paying attention,_ she thought. It was really better when people didn’t pay attention to you, wasn’t it? She went up to the counter. “Fountain drink, miss?” the man asked. A placid-looking middle aged man with clever eyes.

“What do you have that’s good for climate sickness?” Darcy asked.

“I’d recommend a good cherry cola, Miss--?,” he said, giving her a tiny smile.

“Miss Lewis,” Darcy supplied. “Assistant to Miss Jane Foster.” He nodded. Then started making her soda. “You’re the druggist?” she asked. He was wearing a white coat.

“Yes,” he said. He didn’t continue, but made an elaborate show of preparing her soda, garnishing it with a real cherry.

“Delightful,” Darcy said. She sipped a little. “And delicious.”

 

Once she was done with her soda--and blessedly, her headache, Darcy decided to browse the drugstore’s attached five and dime section. In a small town like this, it was a catch-all place for everyday things. They would probably have powder and candy and who knows what else? There was no Woolworth’s in Puente Antiguo. Darcy was looking for Coty powder and taffy candy when someone came inside. The bell jangled. “How’s business, Phil?” a male voice said. There was an edge to it.

“Just fine, Mr. Rumlow,” the druggist said calmly.

“That’s good to hear. Because I’d been hearin’ you were having trouble. It’s a bad thing for a druggist to get in trouble. Real bad in a small town,” he said. “Wouldn’t want to hear about you needin’ to write more prescriptions than necessary,” the other man said. Darcy peered around a shelf. It was the bootlegger from the car out front. He must be the one Erik had mentioned, too. He was standing in front of the soda counter, his hands in his pockets. Several more of his men were leaning against the counter, grinning at one another.

“Oh, I never write more prescriptions than necessary,” the druggist said, in that same placid tone. But there was tension in both their bodies, she saw. _He’s accusing him of writing liquor prescriptions,_ Darcy realized. A druggist could prescribe medicinal liquor. There was a pharmacist at Culver she’d heard about. Some of the fraternity boys had talked about “going in for their medicine,” as a joke, but there were rumors that some druggists ran sidelines in that kind of business and could make a lot of money.

“Good to know,” Rumlow. “Good to know. You have a nice day now, Phil.”

“Mr. Coulson,” the druggist said.

“Pardon me?”

“I’m only on a first-name basis with friends, Mr. Rumlow.”

“C’mon now, Phil, I’m friends with the whole town,” the other man said. “You wouldn’t want to lose my friendship.”

“A great loss,” the druggist said dryly.

“It would be,” he said. “It would be. You enjoy your afternoon, Mr. Coulson.” The bell jangled as the bootleggers left. Darcy stood there for a moment, feeling mad. She was no dry, but she abhorred bullies. When she came to the register with her box of powder and fistful of taffy candy, Darcy smiled sympathetically at Coulson. He seemed not to notice, but later on, she realized he’d undercharged her for the taffy.

 

The matinee was fairly busy. Unfortunately, there was no Valentino. Darcy decided to watch whatever was showing. It wasn’t like Jane minded. Sitting in the theater, she eavesdropped on the people around her:

“Well, I told Jim that land weren’t no good for a ranch--”

“Her husband lives in Albuquerque. She says he works in a factory, but I swanee--”

“I wonder when they’ll get the next Clara Bow? I love Clara Bow.” 

Darcy, much to Jane’s chagrin, loved to eavesdrop. There was nothing more amusing than listening to other people’s conversations. She was listening to two men debate the weather when she overheard someone else use a different voice altogether. “Good afternoon, Mr. Rumlow, gentlemen,” a man said, swallowing audibly. Darcy could practically hear his nerves jangling from the back of the theater, near the door. There was a chorus of similar, respectful-on-the-verge of subservient hellos as the group moved further into the theater. Darcy realized they must be very close to her. Then she felt someone bump the back of her chair and caught the movement of one of the flashy dressers into a theater seat in her peripheral vision. Not just close. Directly behind. The man in front of her, turned, stood up and reached over Darcy’s head for a handshake.

“Good afternoon,” he said to the person behind Darcy. There were murmurs and greetings. The man sitting in front of Darcy accidentally bumped her head with his elbow when he withdrew his hand. “Oh, I’m sorry, miss!” he said, when someone tsk-tsk’d behind them.

“It’s quite all right,” Darcy said smoothly. “I appear to be impeding traffic,” she said. Several people had come up to greet the bootleggers. She found it a little sickening, after that display of menace at the drugstore. Darcy stood up and moved to a seat along the side of the theater instead. She was careful not to look behind her when she did so.

 

Farther from the bootleggers, she was able to concentrate on her movie, too. She’d forgotten about them as the lights went up. She turned to stand and was startled by a veritable wall of human male. A tall man cast a shadow over her. “Pardon me?” Darcy said, craning back her neck to meet his eyes. He looked like someone having a fit of murderous rage, honestly. A scar ran down his chin.

“Mr. Rumlow would like to invite you to a party,” he said, expression unchanging.

“I’m afraid I’ll have to decline,” Darcy said. “I never go to parties. Joe would be upset.”

“Joe?” he said tonelessly.

“My husband. A married woman ought not to, don’t you think?” Darcy said. Sometimes, when she was approached by a particularly odious man, Jane pretended to be married to a husband who traveled for work. Or somesuch. It happened to Jane all the time. Darcy had only had a few opportunities to use the trick. At one party, Darcy had told a Mr. Gattis that her husband Joe was away on a scientific expedition to the Amazon. She was rather fond of that fictional husband, so she decided to call upon him again in her moment of need. The strange man nodded and shuffled away.

Relieved, Darcy got up and left the theater. Curious gazes turned on her and Darcy realized that she was probably recognizable as one of the two new ladyfolk in town. She nodded, greeted people, and smiled. They were friendly enough back. All save one group. The bootleggers were gathered in the lobby. The tall man went to them and said, loud enough for Darcy to hear, “she's got a husband, boss.”

“A husband?” she heard him reply. “Too bad. Does she want to keep him?” There was laughter from the men in the circle. He must be one of those men who wanted his lessers to laugh at all his jokes, she thought contemptuously. As she walked past, she flicked her eyes that way and realized he was watching her, expression still. It was impossible for her not to make a disdainful face in response. Those dark eyes slid away. She pushed the door open and exited the lobby.

Still, she and Jane were careful when they went out into the desert. Heeding Erik’s advice, they headed out at dusk and stuck to maps he’d marked for them that week. Darcy familiarized herself with the map and Puente Antiguo, exploring the town’s one-room library, posting letters for Jane, shopping for the three of them, and entertaining herself with soft drinks and movies in town. Erik and Jane seemed entertained enough by tinkering with astronomy gadgets. She liked Phil Coulson quite a bit. She saw the bootleggers, too, but mostly from a distance, unless she caught Rumlow watching her during the pictures. Which he did sometimes, but not enough that anybody else would notice, Darcy thought. Just occasionally, she would feel something, turn her head, and find a pair of dark eyes watching her from across the aisle.  

 

One evening was quieter than usual. “Where’s everybody?” she asked Phil. She hadn’t seen anyone outside in the street.

“I believe the Rev. Tillis is preaching nearby,” Phil said dryly, cleaning a glass.

“How droll,” Darcy said. “Puente Antiguo might catch religion and have to give up this wet weather.” Phil actually laughed then. Darcy considered it her big accomplishment for the day. She rewarded herself with a Clara Bow picture. 

 

She’d settled into her seat in the mostly empty theater and was searching for some taffy in her pocketbook when the seat next to her creaked as someone sat down. “Where is he?” Rumlow said.

“Excuse me?” Darcy said. Rumlow handed her a piece of taffy. She stared at his hand, then looked back up at him and repeated her question. He smirked slowly.

“You don’t post letters for yourself, you don’t make calls at the drugstore”--too late, Darcy realized the whole town must know that Erik didn’t have a phone--“and you don’t have a ring.”

“I don’t follow you,” Darcy said, shaking her head at the offered taffy.

“No? You love this stuff,” he said. “Take it.”

“No thank you,” she repeated.

“Suit yourself,” he said, putting it back in his pocket.

“I usually do,” she said sharply. He grinned.

“See? No married woman says that. You’re no more married than Clara Bow. Why’d you lie to Jack, then?” he asked.

“My husband and I live apart,” she said simply.

“Money problems?” he asked, tilting his head.

“These questions are intrusive and unsociable,” Darcy said flatly. “A polite man would know better.”

“I’m not a polite man,” he said. “Have dinner with me?”

“No,” she said.

“I wouldn’t mind if you were married, but I don’t think you are,” he said. He leaned closer. “You blush too much when I look at you.” He got up and moved to another seat, but she was acutely conscious of his laughter during the picture.

 

“Jane,” Darcy said, as she lay in bed that night. The door between their rooms’ was open.

“Yeah?” Jane said sleepily. She’d worked all day in Erik’s garage on a new gauge of some sort and Darcy could tell she was tired.

“One of the bootleggers invited me to a party,” Darcy said. “I said no. Told ‘em I had a husband named Joe.”

“Good,” Jane said.

“Today he asked me to dinner, whether or not I had a husband or not,” Darcy said. She wanted to say the words out loud. Jane snorted.

“Men,” Jane said, “are either ridiculous or useless. Except my father and Erik. Who is pantsless.”

“What’s your father, then?” Darcy said, heart sinking. Jane didn’t understand. Dozens of men had chased Jane. All she had to do was enter a room. Classrooms, ballrooms, dry goods’ stores. Everywhere. Darcy had known it would be difficult to explain to someone so used to being noticed how odd it was to be noticed at all.

“Hatless,” Jane said. “He forgets his hats. And sometimes, his shoes.” She started to laugh. “I can’t believe they think we’re the dumb ones.”

“What are we doing tomorrow?” Darcy said. Sometimes it felt like she was always waiting. Waiting to be told what to do. Waiting to be noticed. Waiting for a sign.

“Going out for readings. Erik’s loaning me the Model-T, but it needs gas,” Jane said.

"Okay," Darcy said.

 

Early in the day, Darcy walked to the gas station with a little can. The faded sign above the door said Ward’s Filling Station in blue letters. The attendant was leaning against the screen door, hands dirty. “Need gas?” he said, spitting too near Darcy’s feet. She tried not to recoil too visibly and he smirked.

“Yes,” Darcy said, handing him the can without touching his hand or acknowledging his surly expression. They were standing there when he announced, “Name’s Grant Ward.” Darcy nodded.

“Darcy Lewis,” she said.

“You’re the assistant to that stuck-up science woman who lives with crazy Selvig,” he said, chewing tobacco. Darcy felt a spurt of temper. She about to say something when a yellow puppy stumbled around the corner.

“Hello!” she said, kneeling to pet it. The puppy came towards her, tail wagging, and Ward kicked dirt at it, chuckling meanly. “Hey!” Darcy said. “Don’t do that!”

“Just a stray,” he said. The dog scooted towards Darcy nervously and she picked it up to protect it from Ward’s scuffed boots.

 

She was all too quick to leave when the gas can was full, carrying the puppy in her arms. He squirmed and kissed her face, tail wagging. When she came into the yard, there was a different car in Erik’s garage. Someone must need repairs, she thought, peeking in with the puppy. Erik wasn’t in the garage with Jane as usual. She walked into the house through the side door in the kitchen. “Erik,” she called out, shutting the door behind her, “please don’t be angry. I’ve made a friend. That Grant Ward is a real rotter--”

Darcy froze. Jane and Erik were sitting on one side of Erik’s dining room table. Opposite them, Rumlow was relaxing in a chair. Several of his men were standing around. “Hello, sweetheart,” Rumlow said. “I’m just here discussin’ some business with Selvig. You make a new friend?”

“Business?” Darcy said, looking at Erik and Jane nervously.

“What? You didn’t tell these nice ladies you help me out with some mechanical problems?” Rumlow said.

“No,” Erik said quietly. “Didn’t think you’d appreciate gossip.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said. “That’s true. I don’t.” He rubbed his jaw and grinned at Darcy. “Lemme me see your friend,” he said, reaching out. Darcy wanted to shrink back, but she saw Erik’s tiny head shake. Carefully, she brought the puppy to him without relinquishing it. Rumlow scratched its ears. “Fella looks hungry,” he said. “What’d Ward do?”

“Kicked dirt at him,” Darcy said.

“Dog’s a good thing to have ‘round a place,” Rumlow said. “Jack?”

“Yeah, boss?”

“Run down to Coulson’s and get some cold cuts and sandwiches while Selvig and I settle this,” Rumlow said. “Something for yourselves, too. You want anything?” he asked Darcy. She shook her head. He looked at Erik and Jane. “Miss Foster?”

“No thank you,” Jane said quietly. She managed to flash Darcy a look of intense alarm.

“Sweetheart, can you and Miss Foster go make a pot of joe for me?” Rumlow said.

“Go,” Erik said quietly.

They waited in the kitchen for eight and a half minutes. Darcy knew the time exactly, because after the coffee was brewing she stood absolutely still, holding the dog, and watching the clock, while Jane paced. _Clack-clack-clack_ went Jane’s shoes on the checkerboard floor. The puppy whined. Darcy tried to breathe and prayed Erik wouldn’t be hurt.

 

Finally, Erik called them back into the dining room and requested the coffee. Darcy sat the dog down on the kitchen floor and helped Jane with the coffee tray. The dog slipped into the room with them. It was just Erik and Rumlow now, plus a basket of foodstuffs from the druggist’s lunch counter. Through the window, she could see his men gathered around a car parked nearby. They were eating sandwiches and drinking what looked like beer. Out in the open. Just as casual as you please. “C’mere, fella,” Rumlow said to the puppy, coaxing it over with a piece of meat. “Yeah, you are hungry, aren’t you?” he said, then Darcy watched as his eyes traveled from her feet to her face. He smirked slowly. “You like picnics, Miss Lewis?” he asked, stressing the _miss._ “I know a good place.”

“Isn’t the weather a little warm for picnics?” Jane said, setting down her tray with a louder than typical noise. The cups clattered.

“Not at night,” Rumlow said. “It’s real cool at night. Pretty in the moonlight.”

“Maybe I should get to work on your problem,” Erik said, standing up. “Shouldn’t take more than an hour or two. Ladies, I’ll be back--”

“You’re leaving?” Darcy said, horrified.

“He’s just doing a bit of work for me out at my place. We got some things less moveable than a Ford,” Rumlow said dryly, leaning down to feed the dog again. “Good boy.”

“I’ll be back in a few hours,” Erik said. They followed him and Rumlow out onto the porch. Darcy and Jane looked at each other as Erik got in the car with the bootleggers.

“You think about that picnic, just let me know when you have an inclination,” Rumlow told Darcy, putting his hat on. He grinned at her. “Blood moon’s coming up. Be a good night for it.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> History of the drugstore & soda fountain: http://drugstoremuseum.org/drugstore/


	4. Molasses Taffy and Good Whiskey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and kudos!

“You didn’t tell me,” Jane said, when they were alone. “You said _a bootlegger,_ not that guy.”

“What’s the significance?” Darcy said, feeding the puppy part of a sandwich from the basket.

“He owns the town!” Jane said. “Even Erik is frightened of him.”

“It’s not as if I encouraged him, Jane,” Darcy said. “What am I supposed to do?”

“I don’t understand. It’s not like you normally attract people like this. Why doesn’t he leave you alone? I wouldn’t think a man like that would even pay attention to you,” she said. Darcy tried not to feel stung. She knew, intellectually, that Jane didn’t mean to insult her, but it still hurt. Twenty years of hearing Jane referred to as “the pretty cousin” and the “clever cousin” and “the one who’d go places,” bubbled up, too.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know!” She felt irrational resentment of everything in that moment: bullying bootleggers, Erik for agreeing to work for them in the first place, the climate, gas pump jockeys who kicked at puppies, Jane, the whole damn world. Which was either too hot, too drunk, or too boring to possibly be survived. What was she even doing here? Why had she agreed to come? She picked up the puppy and stormed into her room, shutting the door. All the doors. Darcy turned on the radio.

“Darcy,” Jane said, knocking. “What’s wrong? What did I say?” Darcy pulled the door open.

“Could you at least not insult me while _that man_ is doing God knows what to Erik?” she yelled at Jane.  “Just because I don’t have half of fraternity row following me about, that’s no reason to speculate on why a criminal would bother with me,” Darcy said sharply. “We can’t all be Miss Jane Foster, belle of Virginia!”

“Well, it’s not like I want that!” Jane said. She was sensitive about jealousy, Darcy knew, because she’d lost friends when men started fawning over her. Sharon Carter joked you needed a golf club to get to Jane at a party. It all made Jane a little snappish and defensive. As far as Darcy knew, there wasn’t even a man she’d ever been interested in. She took them all as annoyances and had turned down multiple proposals and would have preferred to socialize with her women friends and discuss their classes anyway. But a small, envious part of Darcy wished she had Jane’s wealth of options. There had been a few of those handsome men who would have caught her eye.

“No,” Darcy said. “But that doesn’t change much, does it?”

“I’m sorry. I only meant that you’re--you’re--”

“What?” Darcy said. She was thinking: _too bosomy, too plump, too sharp tongued..._

“Decent? You’d think he’d want a fast woman, not a college-educated girl from a good family is all,” Jane said. Darcy started to laugh. “Why are you laughing?”

“It’s a small town, maybe he’s been through all the wild women already,” Darcy said.

“Oh,” Jane said. “I didn’t think of that.”

“No common sense,” Darcy said, more teasingly.

“Should we leave?” Jane said.

“What about your research?” Darcy said, stunned that Jane would even suggest it.

“I don’t like the way he looks at you,” Jane said.

“How does he look at me?” Darcy said, petting the dog.

“Like Dean Wilson looked at a steak dinner at that guest lecture,” Jane said grimly. In spite of--or maybe because of--her nerves, Darcy started to laugh.

 

They had positioned themselves near the front windows when Rumlow’s Ford pulled up. “Oh thank God,” Jane said, rushing out to the yard when she saw Erik emerge from the sedan. Darcy followed. Erik smiled at them. He looked a little sweaty, but uninjured. Darcy almost sagged with relief.

“Don’t worry, girls,” Erik said. “Got it all sorted out.”

“I appreciate your help,” Rumlow said, casually reaching into his pocket. Darcy jumped. She hadn’t realized he’d gotten out of the car behind Erik. As she watched, he handed Erik cash. A large amount. She and Jane looked at each other; Jane’s eyes were wide.

“Thank you,” Erik said quietly.

“A little gift for your trouble, too. Fellas, take it around to the kitchen,” he said into the car. Two of them got out and carried boxes from the trunk to Erik’s side door. Darcy heard the clink of glass bottles. Erik looked at the men, then at Rumlow.

“Jane’s very mechanically-minded,” he said.

“That right, Miss Foster?” Rumlow said.

“Yes,” Jane said, looking at Erik in confusion.

“I could have used a second set of lighter hands out there,” Erik said quietly.

“The guys try to help, but it’s finer work,” Rumlow said, studying Jane. “I’d make it worth your trouble,” he told the scientist. “Erik’s says you’re here studying astronomy?”

“Yes,” Jane said. She’d kept her face calm, but Darcy could tell she was nervous.

“You give Erik a hand when I need help, nobody’ll bother you and you can have the run of the mesa for your star gazing,” Rumlow said. He offered his hand to Jane. She looked at Erik. He nodded yes.

“It’s safe work, Jane,” Erik said.

“Easy money,” Rumlow added. “No trouble, really.”

“All right,” Jane said tentatively. She extended a hand and shook Rumlow’s, a line furrowing between her brows.

“Good,” Rumlow said, giving her a cryptic smile. His eyes turned to Darcy. “Can I have a word, Miss Lewis?” he asked.

 

Darcy could hear Jane and Erik arguing quietly as she and Rumlow walked down the street. He was close, but didn’t touch her, merely guiding her by placing a hand near her elbow. She waited for him to speak first. “What do you like?” he asked suddenly. “Good whiskey? Cigarettes?”

“I don’t drink whiskey and I never smoke,” Darcy said.

“You’ve never smoked?” he said. “C’mon.”

“No,” Darcy said. “My mother says it’s unladylike to smoke. Even if you try to pretty it up with a silver holder, it’s still a man’s habit.” He sighed. Darcy raised an eyebrow at him curiously.

“No cigarettes. No hooch. You just eat taffy candy.” He shook his head, chuckling. They walked in silence for a second. “What do you need?” he said.

“My needs are all met,” she told him sharply. He grinned.

“You like mink?” he asked, more teasingly. “I could get you a mink.”

“In this heat?” Darcy said, gobsmacked.

“You could wear it to the pictures. They got air-conditioning,” he said. “I’ve got plenty of ice at home, too. Maybe we could find you a cocktail you like? Something to keep you cool?” Darcy scoffed.

“You can’t treat me, Mr. Rumlow, I’m not a charity girl,” she told him. He was a fool if he mistook her for a girl who took gifts--people called it ‘treating’--in exchange for acts of affection. He stopped and turned to face her, expression intent.

“You won’t have me, huh? Nothing I’ve got is any interest to you?” he said.

“Nope,” she said. He grinned slowly.

“No’s a word I don’t hear, Miss Lewis,” he said. “People say it to me and, well, it just don’t register.”

“Must make your life pretty difficult,” she said. He actually smirked then.

“Not at all. Not at all. Everything I have’s down to doing what other men are too afraid to do because somebody told ‘em no once,” he said. “I’ll send you something.”

 

She watched from Erik’s dry lawn as he drove away. Erik and Jane argued for a long time; Darcy sat quietly and listened as she played with the dog. She felt sweaty and tired. Eventually, the two scientists retreated to their corners. Then there was a knock. Erik and Jane looked at each other.

“I’ll go,” Erik said.

“Damn right you will,” Jane muttered. She was angry he’d dragged her into this mess. Darcy heard greetings exchanged. Someone followed Erik into the living room. One of Rumlow’s men had arrived with a basket of oranges from California, a pound of taffy candy, and a bottle of champagne, dewy with condensation from being kept cold. He sat it down in the living room, nodded politely to Darcy, and disappeared into the dark again. “Oh dear God,” Jane said. “What do we do?”

“Take it,” Erik said. “You have to learn to deal with reality out here, if you do want to stay.” He poured from a bottle of Rumlow’s whiskey.

“Does everyone in this town take gifts from him? And what does he want from her?” Jane said.

“Pretty much,” Erik said. He looked at Darcy and frowned. “I don’t know what he wants with Darcy. There’s women around, but I don’t see them with him specifically. I’ve been to a few of the parties--”

“You’ve been to the parties?” Darcy asked.

“They’re good parties,” Erik said. “But they have them in the other men’s houses--Rollins,’ O’Rourke, Franchetti--never at Rumlow’s. What? Nobody turns down a party, Jane.”

“Why? Why don’t they have them at his house?” Darcy said, over Jane’s vexed sputtering.

“He keeps a quiet house. His mother’s his housekeeper and she doesn’t even speak English,” Erik said. “She came over from Sicily or some damn place. You didn’t think his name was actually Rumlow, did you? Not with that complexion!”

“He’s not Al Capone’s cousin, is he?” Jane asked in horror.

“Who knows?” Erik said. “All these bootleggers could be anybody’s cousin. But he makes a damn good whiskey.”  

Jane said several things in frustration and then proceeded to an extensive lecture on the subjects of _quiet life, scientific invention, ethical behavior._ Darcy stood up and took the bag of candy to her room. Slipping out of her shoes and stockings, she changed into pajamas and lay across the bed. “No, no,” she told the nameless puppy, as he tried to snag her stockings. “Chew your rags.” She’d made him a toy of knotted scrap rags while they waited for Erik’s return. His tail thumped happily when she tossed it. Darcy turned on the radio. Bessie Smith was singing. She looked at the bag of taffy and took out a molasses one. It practically melted on her tongue in the heat. Sugar-sweet and rich. Her mind wandered, as she ate the sweets. The scent of the dry desert air seemed to bloom at night, Darcy thought. It would be nice to have something cool, too. She crept quietly downstairs. The stuff had been moved into the kitchen. Jane and Erik were still debating ethics. Darcy stuffed oranges in her pajama pockets. She gazed at the cold champagne in the refrigerator for a long moment, but chose to fill a glass with lemonade instead. She could turn down a drink, but the oranges and candy would go bad in the heat. 

When she and Jane went out to observe the next evening, Darcy put a few of her oranges in the basket of foodstuffs in Erik’s old Model-T. They took the one road out to the desert. A few miles out of town, they were stopped by men armed with large guns. “Christ Almighty,” Darcy muttered, as they melted out from the dark. Then the feral-faced man from the movie theater leaned down into the car.

“This is Miss Foster and Miss Lewis, fellas, they’re special guests,” he said. “They can come and go as they please.”

“Thank you,” Jane said, through clenched teeth. Darcy realized they were all peering at her curiously.

“Boss’s girl?” one of them asked, while they were driving away.

“Yup,” the man said. “The Lewis girl.” 

She would have thought about it more, but Jane seemed to be getting some interesting mathematical numbers out of the trajectory she was tracking. She got more and more excited as they watched the skies and Darcy peeled oranges and ate them. Her fingers were sticky-sweet in the dark. The sky was so velvety out here, Darcy thought, smelling the night air. “Darce,” Jane said, calling her over, “this is amazing. Look into the telescope. See that flair?” She took the telescope’s edge from Jane.

“I do,” Darcy said in amazement. Usually, she saw nothing whenever Jane noticed tiny changes in the night sky. But these were like sparks from a firecracker. “Wonderful,” she said, looking at Jane in awe.

 

When they drove back to the house, it was perfectly quiet. Erik was sitting on the porch with the puppy in his undershirt and pajama bottoms. “He sent more things,” he said to Darcy. “I put the food in the kitchen and the rest of ‘em in your room.”

“Thanks,” Darcy said. Jane made a sound of displeasure behind her. Darcy went into the house.

“They had guns on the road--” she could hear Jane telling Erik. In the kitchen, Darcy found steaks, cheese in a ceramic crock, and more fruit.

“Where does he find it all?” she wondered out loud. Then it dawned on her that the crate on the floor was stamped California. Coastal San Diego was only eleven or so hours away from Puente Antiguo in a fast car, the inland towns closer. She and Jane had studied it on the map, in case there was anywhere they wanted to go. The roads went through Tucson as well. More demand for liquor, she thought? Uneager to fight with Jane, she ate some of the food and went upstairs for a cool bath. Her clothes were sandy and dusty. In her bedroom, she found another box, this time some refreshing eau de cologne splash, soap, and talcum powder to combat the heat.

“At least all his gifts are food,” Jane said grimly, as they both lay in their beds that night. “Or other reasonable things.”

“Oh, yes,” Darcy said dryly. “Very wholesome, for a gangster.” She had a piece of orange taffy in her hands.

“The kinds of things you'd buy your grandmother. But what does he want for them in trade?” Jane asked. They all knew his friendship had a transactional quality at the best of times. “Darcy?” Jane said.

“Yes?” Darcy said quietly.

“If you go somewhere with him, you should put it in your purse….” Jane began. “You know what I mean. Or maybe you should just start carrying it?”

“I already have,” Darcy said. One of their Culver friends had secretly helped people obtain family planning devices. Jane had convinced Darcy to get one in solidarity, arguing it ought to be their right not to fear pregnancy as much as any man’s. Although she’d never had cause to use it, there was a diaphragm hidden in Darcy’s things.

“Oh,” Jane said. Darcy heard Jane sit up in the dark. “Are you afraid?” she asked quietly. “Of--of a bad date?”

“No, not really,” Darcy said.

“You’re not?” Jane said.

“It’s terrifically difficult to be afraid of a man who tries to charm you with cheese and taffy when he realizes you’re too dull for cigarettes and whiskey,” Darcy said archly.

“Darcy,” Jane scolded.

 

The next day, Brock sat next to her at the pictures, at a distance from his men. He’d sent a note asking her to come. “Can I walk you home?” he asked quietly, eyes on the screen.

“Yes,”  Darcy said, taking the popcorn he offered.

“Yes?” he said, head swiveling in her direction. He sounded surprised.

“Or maybe I just said no, but you can’t hear it,” she said sarcastically. He laughed then.

“You’re a very entertaining girl,” he said.

“We’ve spent all of five minutes in the same company,” Darcy said, eyebrows raised.

“You can learn a lot about somebody, watching ‘em watch a picture,” he said, stealing a little popcorn so that his arm snaked over hers. "And I been thinking about you."

“Tell it to Sweeney, Mr. Rumlow,” she said, trying to convey her lack of gullibility.

“You’re trying to kid me, but I do have a Sweeney on the payroll,” he said, grinning.

 

He walked her home in the dusk. She was surprised when he kept himself physically distant. Almost carefully so. Neither of them spoke at first, but Darcy decided to be bold. Maybe even insulting. “Erik says your mother keeps house for you,” she told him, “so why bother with this charade?”

“What’s that mean?” he said, pushing his hat up.

“You know what it means,” Darcy said. He seized her elbow and turned her to face him. He looked grim.

“Explain it to me,” he said slowly.

“You’ve got a mother to do your laundry, what do you need to chase me for?” Darcy asked pertly. He tilted his head curiously, so she went on. “Because if you think you can get into my knickers outside of the bonds of matrimony, you’ve got sunstroke, Mr. Rumlow,” she said. He let go of her elbow, the tips of his fingers dragging down her forearm.

“That so?” he said, grinning.

“Exactly so,” Darcy said, arriving at Erik’s yard.

“Maybe I like your company,” he said.

“Sure,” she said skeptically.

“I like looking at you,” he said. “I could look at you for hours. Just look.” His voice was low and heated. It was difficult for Darcy not to laugh in his face.

“That seems like a terrible waste of oranges and taffy,” Darcy said.

“No,” he said and she caught him licking his lips a little. “Not at all.”

 

They kept up this routine for two weeks. Erik fixed Rumlow’s other vehicle, without anybody mentioning stills or the bullet holes in one spot. Rumlow sent her gifts, Darcy went to the pictures with Rumlow a few times a week. They talked about normal things. Nothing dangerous. He walked her home, where Jane would wait in the Model-T to go for a night survey. She and Jane trekked out to the desert in the evenings, tracking a series of growing atmospheric disturbances on maps and by sight description. Jane was thrilled. Darcy was wildly confused. Rumlow’s presents grew more elaborate--a bottle of French perfume, a pair of earrings, more champagne, in addition to more food--but he never touched her, except to help her off a curb.

He was cryptic about his bootlegging, and his business, but he persisted in asking to see her. She learned he liked baseball, Gloria Swanson’s movies, smoked too many cigarettes, hardly drank more than the occasional whiskey, was very fond of his mother and had a younger sibling still living at home.  She got into the car one night and looked at Jane. “Sorry I’m late, Rumlow was asking me--well, I don’t even remember how we got started,” she said. He seemed to want to know her opinions on everything. 

Everyone in town knew, too. Darcy caught whispers from people in the street and, to her surprise, some envious remarks and glances. When she went to the drugstore to pick up a headache medicine for Erik, who had been imbibing, Phil Coulson looked up from where he was wiping down the counter and sighed. “Darcy Lewis,” he said gently, “are you about to involve yourself in some trouble?”

“You’d think so,” Darcy said honestly, “but mostly I just watch stars in the desert with Jane and see a movie every now and then.”

“That right?” Phil said wryly.

“I anticipate tripping over a telescope or eating myself sick on popcorn are my greatest hazards,” Darcy said. Phil smiled.

“Good,” he said. “Root beer float?”

 

On the way back from the pictures, Rumlow offered her his arm. Darcy took it. He was talking about the movie when Darcy stopped. “You all right, sweetheart?” he asked.

“What are your intentions, Mr. Rumlow?” Darcy asked. His expression went curiously blank. He blinked at her.

“My intentions?” he said. “Well, I was thinking about San Diego.”

“Pardon?” Darcy asked.

“There’s a good hotel there, right on the beach. Plenty of privacy. We could go on a trip,” he said. “Just the two of us.”

“That sounds an awful lot like a honeymoon. Do you want to marry me?” Darcy said, more out of daring and sheer cussedness than actual matrimonial designs. She couldn’t see herself as the bootlegger’s wife. But she was irritated by his ambiguity. What was he thinking? “I’ll give you time to think on that,” Darcy told a still-silent Rumlow as she went into the house.

Darcy had almost closed the screen door when he called out to her. “What about that husband? Do I need to take you to Reno?” he said. Darcy laughed.

”What husband? He never calls and he doesn’t write,” Darcy said through the screen.

 

She and Jane were driving in the desert that night when Darcy worked up the nerve to tell Jane what she’d asked him. “What do you think Rumlow’s intentions are?” Darcy asked.

“His intentions?” Jane said, as the Model-T bounced along. There were odd clouds in the sky. The night was moonless.

“Yes,” Darcy said.

“You think he has them?” Jane said, peering up the sky. "I didn't think he had a scruple, much less an intention--"

“Jane, look out!” Darcy said. A large figure had staggered out in the road ahead of them, illuminated by the Model-T’s headlights. There was blood on his shirt front. Jane jerked the wheel and they narrowly avoided running him over. Stopping the car, both women ran over the man sprawled in the sand.

“He’s been shot,” Jane said, kneeling next to him. He was tall, fair-haired, and strongly built. Darcy saw Jane’s gaze linger on the handsome face.

“Help--help me,” the man said, coming to and coughing up dirt. They both jumped back. Darcy reached for a soda bottle to use as a weapon. She’d absent-mindedly stuck the empty glass bottle in her purse. In the distance, there was a sudden burst of gunfire.

“Oh my God,” Darcy said to Jane. “What do we do?”

“Get me out of here,” the man said. “Can you take me to Erik Selvig?”

“You know Erik?” Jane said, as the man stood. He was massive. Darcy backed up. He didn’t seem altogether safe.

“Yes,” the man said. “I’m a friend of his. These bootleggers, they can’t see me, or they’ll finish the job.”

 

“He’s another bootlegger,” Darcy whispered to Jane, once they’d hidden the man in their backseat under a blanket.

“Erik,” Jane said grimly. “And his booze!”

“Oh, no,” Darcy said. There were headlights ahead. Cars set up as a blockade on the road. They stopped.

“It’s a blockade,” Jane whispered to the man. He grunted in response. They waited as one of the figures--all legs and long gun silhouetted in the headlights--walked over. It was Jack Rollins.

“Oh, it’s you, Miss Lewis. Miss Foster,” he said, looking surprised.

“We heard gunfire,” Darcy said. Rollins swallowed.

“Yeah,” he said. “Spot of bother out there tonight. Best you go home, stay in. Boss’d have our hides. He didn’t know you were out here tonight, since the sky’s so cloudy.”

“Yeah,” Jane said. “We’re leaving.” He waved them through. Darcy was tense for another two miles. They drove slowly into town, down main street, past the darkened drugstore and movie theater marquee. The man in the backseat sighed.

“Must I hide?” he said.

“Yes!” Jane said. She pulled the Model-T behind Erik’s house. Darcy got Erik and waited in the kitchen while the other two brought the injured man inside. Erik took him into one of the bathrooms and then must've been shooed away by Jane, because he appeared at Darcy’s elbow.

“How badly is he hurt?” she said.

“Only a flesh wound in his arm and another on his thigh. Jane thinks she can stitch him up,” Erik said. He looked grim.

“Who is he? How do you know him?” Darcy asked.

“His name is Thor Odinson. I knew him when he was younger. Now he’s a Federal Prohibition Agent,” Erik said.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should have mentioned that this is a No Powers AU, she realized. It's a No Powers AU, y'all!


	5. Shaking The Trees

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and kudos! Y'all are so awesome. This is an All Brock-POV chapter.

“He’s disappeared,” Rumlow said to Jack. They’d surveyed the hidden stills and the separate bottling building tucked in different, remote corners of the ranch, carefully screened from the places where guests were invited. “You see anything useful out there? You’re better at tracking than I am, Jackie.”

“No,” Jack said. “He could be hiding somewhere, but he was a big fella. Difficult to hide when you’re bleeding.”

“I just want to know who he was with, if we need to worry about poachers turnin’ into a problem,” Rumlow said. “Send out Sweeney and Franchetti to keep watch. We’ll look for him again at first light, then go into town and shake some trees, see what falls out.”

“You think somebody in Chicago or California’s trying to cut us out?” Jack asked quietly. Sometimes, your partners turned on you. The Chicago Outfit were all mad as March hares and not to be trusted, but people tended to make noise coming all the way from Chicago. They stood out. They’d bribed some gas station attendants to tip ‘em off if they saw new folk in fast cars and good suits. There had been no reports along the main roads from the East. That left people West, though. Congress had changed the laws about off-shore drinking cruises from three miles out to twelve. That had hurt some people’s business in California, but it was a flimsy excuse to target them. The man could have just been there to steal for personal use, but he’d definitely been looking for their stills. They’d found his flashlight and a map marked with the ranch’s general location.

“Dunno,” Rumlow said, rolling his cigarette. He smoked when he was puzzling out a problem. “We’ll find him, don’t matter who he is. Get some rest.”

“Brock?” Jack said.

“Huh?” Rumlow said. Jack seldom used his first name. Nobody did. The fake name was a poor fit, like too small shoes. But Italian names attracted too much notice.

“Miss Lewis and Miss Foster were out there tonight,” Jack said quietly. “I let ‘em through the blockade, told ‘em to stay in town, we were having some trouble.”

“Damn,” Rumlow said. “Did they see anything?”

“Nope, just heard gunshots, they said,” Jack said. “Sweeney thought he saw something moving, turned out to be a big coyote.”

“I’ll make it up to her,” Rumlow said, studying the end of his cigarette. They got in the car and drove to the row of new bootleggers’ cabins. Rumlow dropped off Jack with a nod.

 

The ranch house was the oldest and largest building on the property. Long and low. He’d added a mudroom off the kitchen so he wouldn’t track in dirt. He hung his gun, changed his shoes, and washed his arms and face. The kitchen clock, visible through the door, said it was after midnight. He would have a sandwich and get some sleep. He smiled when he saw the glass dish on the counter. His mother had made his favorite orange cake. It was still warm. Which meant she was probably awake.

 

He found her sleeping on the sofa in the adjoining living room. She must’ve been trying to read; the ladies’ magazine had slid off her lap onto the floor. His sister had been teaching her to read the English recipe articles so she had new things to cook. They both seemed fascinated by the elaborate desserts and salads, so he brought them magazines from town. Did she want an ice cream maker, he wondered? He tried not to get her anything that was too hard to operate. Neither of them had the strength. Still, he could get one of the men to churn or he could. Rumlow took the blanket off the back of the sofa and draped it over her, bending to drop a kiss on his mother’s forehead. Her eyes opened slowly. “Calogero?” she said.

“Hey, Mama, what are you doing out here?” he said. He patted the tendril of marcelled hair that had escaped from the low bun she wore.

“You are not hurt?” she said, sitting up a fraction.

“I'm fine, but you need to go to bed, you don’t need to wait up for me,” he scolded gently.

“Did you eat?” she said, ignoring his scolding.

“I’m just going to have a sandwich, you go to bed,” he said.

“I will make it--oh,” she said, horrified, when she spotted the fallen magazine on the floor. “It fell,” she said apologetically. When he handed it to her, she straightened the pages.   

“Mama, it’s okay,” he said. “You can throw it out the window, if you want.” He smiled at her and she shook her head.

“Throw out a window? It is _expensive,”_ she said seriously. “Why would I throw your magazine out? That is ten cents!”

“It’s your magazine, you can hit me with it if you want,” he said, pinching her cheek. She laughed at him and shooed him away, standing up put the blanket back over the sofa neatly.

“Is even to you?” she asked him.

“Looks neat to me, Mama,” he told her. She kept the house spotless and tidy at all hours. Rollins joked you could eat off the floor wherever Rumlow’s mother lived.

“Is off,” she said, shaking her head and straightening an edge.

 

She brushed away his attempts to make his own sandwich, too. “I will make you the scrambled eggs and tomatoes one you like,” she said seriously.

“I can do the eggs,” he said. “You sit and slice the tomatoes for me?” he bargained. “You do them the best way.” He knew that she would sit if he asked her this way.

“All right,” she said. She sat at the kitchen table and sliced carefully, sprinkling the tomatoes with salt and pepper. “More pepper?”

“Sure,” he said pleasantly. The eggs were cooking when there was a sound in the hallway. Frankie was coughing. His sister emerged in her long nightgown, yawning sleepily.

“What are you doing up?” his mother said to Frankie. She still fussed over the twenty year old as if she was small.

“I had to pee,” she grumbled, coughing a little again. 

“Francesca, sit,” his mother said. She never called them by their nicknames.

“You want eggs?” he asked Frankie. He’d put in enough for more than one person, hoping to coax his mother into eating again. She ate like a bird lately. She was getting almost as bad as Frankie.

“I want cake,” Frankie said. He laughed.

“Sandwich, then cake,” his mother said.

 

They were eating sandwiches in the kitchen when his mother left the room. “Where’s she going?” Frankie wondered out loud. “Is something, somewhere, not perfectly clean?”

“Hush, smart mouth,” Rumlow said.

“You going to tell her you were out after midnight with that Miss Lewis?” Frankie challenged. He stopped eating to stare at her.

“Who told you about that?” he asked.

“Pfffht, Sweeney’s louder than five men,” Frankie said. Rumlow shook his head and rubbed his jaw. Sweeney was deaf in one ear because of an accident. He tended to shout.

“I wasn’t out with Miss Lewis,” he told his sister seriously. “We had a trespasser. Big fair man. I don’t think he’ll come near the house, but if he does--”

“I get to shoot him?” Frankie said flippantly.

“I’m not kidding Frankie,” he said. “Be careful.”

“Fine, then. Did you know Mama is still hiding her money in a coffee can? It doesn't matter how much you give her, she'll only spend five dollars a week maximum. Me, on the other hand, I could really contribute to the economy if you let me go to California to dress shop again," Frankie said.

"I haven't forgotten you telling that layabout that your name was Miss Woolworth. He tried to follow you home on the train," Rumlow said. Frankie grinned.

"He was a real looker. I hear Miss Lewis is a looker, too,” Frankie said. “The old-fashioned type, but one nonetheless.”

“Sure,” he said, unable to hide his grin. “Who says so? Sweeney?”

“O’Rourke,” Frankie said.

“Have you been spending time with O’Rourke?” he said, putting down his sandwich. He’d caught O’Rourke giving her a sip of whiskey once and kept an eye on them ever since.

“Who says I have to tell you?” Frankie said archly.

"You better not be smoking again," he said. "Your lungs, you hear me?"

“I'm not smoking. I’m having some of this cake,” his sister said. She cut herself a piece and carried it out of the room.

“Where are you going?” he said.

“I’m eating in bed. I’m an invalid, haven’t you heard?” she called back.

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten O’Rourke,” he grumbled. “He’s too old for you!”

“Call a cop,” she said cheerfully from the hallway. She snuck into her room with the cake, humming a jazz song. He thought it was "Indian Love Call."

“Where’d you go?” he asked his mother, when she came back into the kitchen.

“Your hot water bottle,” she said. “I forget.”

“Mama, you don’t need to worry about that,” he said. He insisted that he could do his own dishes and made her go to bed. It was bad enough that she was still hiding money, he thought.

 

He slept for a few hours and then got up when he heard the house phone ring at six. “Hello,” he said, once he’d walked out to the kitchen and taken the phone from the receiver.

“Mr. Rumlow?” The voice was tentative, high-pitched.

“Speaking,” he said.  

“I heard about a man in town,” the voice whispered. “Came to the drugstore yesterday. Big blonde man--”

“That’s who I’m looking for,” Rumlow said.

“Yes, sir. I heard him talking to Coulson. He’s a Norwegian, like Selvig, from up in the Dakotas,” the voice said. “Had a funny name, like Bodenson.”

“Did he say he knew Selvig?” Rumlow asked.

“Can’t say as I know, it was Coulson who brought up Selvig being from Norway. Sorry,” the voice said.

“I appreciate your help, Mr.--?,” Rumlow said.

“Jones from the movie theater, sir,” the voice said.

“They’ll be a reward waiting for you,” Rumlow told him before he hung up. Rumlow dialed again. “We got a name,” he said. “Meet you in five.”

 

He drove into town with Jack. First, they stopped at the drugstore. Coulson was mopping the counter and continued to do so as Rumlow walked up. “Good morning, Mr. Rumlow,” he said.

“Morning, Coulson,” Rumlow said.

“How can I help you? Cream soda? Headache powder?” Coulson asked.

“We’re looking for someone. Big man called Bodenson. Norwegian.” Rumlow said. “I’ve heard he was here and you spoke to him?”

“I can’t say I remember anyone called Bodenson,” Coulson said.

“You don’t remember?” Rumlow said, tapping the edge of the counter.

“Can’t say I do,” Coulson said.

“You have any memories come back to you, you know where to find me,” Rumlow said.

“I certainly do. You have a good day now, Mr. Rumlow,” he said. “Associate of Rumlow,” he said to Jack. Rumlow was already to the door.

“Rollins,” Jack said.

“I wasn’t aware you were allowed to have individual names,” Coulson said coolly, as Rumlow exited.

 

“We’ll go see Selvig, see if the name rings any bells for him,” Rumlow said, when Jack climbed into the Ford. He didn’t say it out loud, but he wouldn’t mind seeing Darcy Lewis, either. If she was awake. He knocked sharply. A half-dressed Erik answered the door.

“Mr. Rumlow?” he said. His expression was confused. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

“I wasn’t expecting to be here, either, Selvig,” Rumlow said. “I have a missing Norwegian problem.”

“Oh,” Erik said. “Me?”

“Not exactly,” Rumlow said. “You know a Bodenson?”

“Bodenson? No,” Erik said. He shook his head. They were standing in the foyer, discussing the trespasser, when Darcy came out of the door that led to the house’s kitchen.

“Erik, who was here--oh,” she said. She was wearing light dressing gown. She blushed. “I didn’t realize it was you,” she said to him. “I’m making breakfast for the three of us.”

“Smells delicious,” he said, thinking that he ought to buy her a dressing gown that was less shabby. This one was worn to a pleasant, curve-revealing thinness, however. He didn’t hate it. “You need a hand?” he offered.

“You want to help me flip pancakes?” she said, biting her bottom lip.

“Wouldn’t mind at all,” he said, handing Jack his jacket and hat.

 

Rumlow looked at the lines of her back as she stood by the stove. She glanced back at him tentatively. Her cheeks were pink. He didn’t think it was the heat of the cooking pan. “You nervous?” he asked. “Being alone with me now?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head up and down as if to say yes.

“No?” he said, chuckling.

“I don’t even have any powder on,” she said. “It’s embarrassing to have somebody see me like this.”

“Don’t need it,” he said, stepping closer. The back of her hair was mussed. He patted it with his fingers.

“My hair’s so troublesome,” Darcy said. “I thought bobbing it would make it easier to manage.” She flipped a pancake and he noticed how pink her neck was. “I’ve been thinking,” she said, as he toyed with a strand of hair so that the backs of his fingers grazed her neck.

“Yeah?” he said. 

“About San Diego?” she said. She half-turned her head to look at him behind her. Her lashes were dark against her pale skin. He'd been trying to go slow with her, she was so sheltered. But there was something yearning and almost sad in her expression. Wistful. 

“You want to go with me?” he said, slipping an arm around her waist and pulling her close. He felt her sink into his embrace and put his mouth close to her ear. “I’d like that,” he said. "If you went with me."

"Would you?" she said, ducking her head shyly.

"All the way to San Diego," he said.

“Mr. Rumlow,” she said, breath hitching as he slipped the robe off a fraction. He caressed her skin with his fingers and brushed his mouth against the line of her shoulder. 

“Yes?” he said. She turned to face him fully, but her eyes were focused on his throat. She was blushing wildly, two spots of pink high in her cheeks.

“I shouldn’t--I shouldn’t want--,” Darcy began nervously, her fingers working the tie of her robe.

“Shouldn’t want pancakes?” he offered lightly, tipping her chin up so she’d have to meet his eyes.

“No, I shouldn’t,” she said, eyes moving to his lips. She leaned in a little. He moved forward, too.

“Pancakes can be very wholesome,” he said. “Natural. It’s only natural to want pancakes.”

“You think so?” she said. “Because I really want them. Sometimes. So much it makes me nervous.”

He closed the distance between them and pulled her closer to him. She was clean-smelling and soft. His fingers kneaded her hip gently. The first touch of her mouth was tentative, hesitant, so he let her breathe a little. Their eyes met. He smiled at her. "What you afraid of, Miss Lewis?" he said. That seemed to be all the encouragement she needed. She grew braver, pressing herself against him. He sucked at her top lip and she whined in response.

“I can’t get my hands on you,” she said, fingers splayed over his suspenders for balance as she stood on her tiptoes. Without thinking, he scooped her up and put her on the kitchen counter. As he kissed her frantically, she traced him. Her touch was exploratory: small, soft hands ran up his shirtsleeves, across his jawline, and through his hair, even the fleshy line at the back of his neck where his hair was clipped short. She was half out of her robe when Jack knocked.

“Boss, we’ve got another tip, somebody sent a note when they saw your car,” he said through the door. Darcy froze and Rumlow pulled back, groaning in dismay.

“Sorry,” he said, catching her startled gaze. Seeming to recollect herself, her expression turned mortified and she dropped her eyes to the floor.

“I’m sorry,” Darcy said. “I don’t know what came over me--” He tilted her chin up and kissed her again, a little more roughly. She made a tiny hum of surprise when he slid his tongue between her lips. He felt her scramble to hold onto him, gripping his shirt.

“Don’t be sorry,” he said, when they separated, "I'm not." She was trembling. His breathing felt ragged. He kissed the side of her cheek. “I’ll see you on Wednesday.” That was when he took her to the pictures.

“Okay,” she said, staring at him. Those blue eyes were wide and stunned. He licked his lips.

“Darcy,” he said.

“Yes?”

“Don’t let your pancakes burn,” he teased. She seized the dish towel off the counter and threw it at him with a noise of frustration.

“Get out, you rascal,” she told him. He laughed.

“Some married woman you are, Miss Lewis,” he said, his hand on the kitchen door. He looked at her, sitting next to the eggs on the kitchen counter, smiled, and left. She was the last thing he saw. 

 

He missed Jane peering at him from the upstairs window in the room where Thor Odinson was hiding. 


	6. Subject in Everything

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

“He’s gone,” Darcy said, sticking her head into Jane’s bedroom. A shirtless and bandaged Thor Odinson was laying in Jane’s bed, petting the dog. Jane looked up from the chair she’d dragged next to the bed. Ever since the man had arrived, Jane had made no effort to hide her partiality. She was utterly smitten, Darcy knew. She had sat up with him all night, talking in a low, girlish voice that Darcy had never heard her use before. Even now, with shadows under her eyes and a rumpled dress, there were spots of color in Jane’s cheeks.  

“You’re sure?” Jane said, frowning at Darcy. The man spoke at the same time.

“Thank you, Darcy,” he said.

“You’re welcome,” Darcy said quietly. To Jane, she said, “his car’s gone, but that doesn’t mean the neighbors won’t spy for Rumlow. Someone sent the Wilson boy with a tip. He’ll need to lay low.” Darcy meant Thor would need to be discreet. She made to leave and Jane followed her into the hallway.

“Does he suspect us?” Jane asked.

“No,” Darcy said.

“How do you know?” Jane said.

“I reckon it’s because she was keeping him busy in the kitchen,” Erik said. He was standing at the foot of the stairs. “We’ll need to move Odinson into the cellar, just to be safe. Tonight.”

“Why can’t he stay in my room?” Jane asked.

“Where will you sleep?” Darcy said.

“On the floor,” Jane said, her jaw working.

“You will not,” Thor said, appearing with the dog tucked under one muscular arm. “I will go to the cellar, Erik.”

 

They snuck him down into the cellar, setting up a makeshift room so he could heal. Darcy went back upstairs first, but lingered long enough to hear Jane and Thor talking. “What is her relationship to him?” the federal agent asked. “Is she trustworthy?”

“Of course,” Jane said loyally. “He’s a bully, anyway. He bullied his way into this whole town.”

“She doesn’t care for him?” Thor said.

“How could she? He’s just some Italian gangster,” Jane said.

 

That night, Darcy lay in bed. The puppy dozed at her feet. She was listening to the low hum of the radio, turned as low it would go. She’d hoped it would lull her into sleep. It was that preacher again. His voice was a static-laced whisper.

 

_“And verse 23 tells us, “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: And he is the saviour of the body...here we learn that the husband is the savior of the wife’s body, her protector and provider. He is to provide and she is to submit “in everything,” as Christ provides for the church. She is subject to her husband in all matters...Women are to submit to their husbands, but the husband’s responsibility is a sober one, a holy obligation. I want you to think upon those words. The “saviour of the body.” Here is such holy tenderness, such loving care on the part of the husband, and such gentle submission on the part of the wife that we ought to be ashamed of acrimony, rebelliousness, and selfishness in our own homes....”_

 

Darcy turned the radio off. There were taffy candies left in the drawer, but she turned her head away from them, so she was facing the window. The moon was almost full, hanging low in the sky. From Jane’s room, Darcy heard a squeak. Jane was up and moving around. Darcy heard her leave her room and the characteristic squeak of the staircase. Jane was going downstairs, she realized. She waited ten minutes, then got up and pushed the door to Jane’s room open. The bed was empty. Darcy stood there for a moment. She was going back to bed when a thought occurred to her. Stepping over the threshold, she crept quietly over to Jane’s dresser and opened the top drawer on the right. There was an empty space where Jane’s diaphragm was usually kept. Darcy shut it carefully again.

 

In the morning, she looked at Erik. “What does Odinson want to do?” she asked.

“Needs to get in touch with the Albuquerque field office,” Erik said. “I was going to go into town and make a call from the drugstore.”

“What if someone hears you?” Darcy said. The telephone was up at the front of the store, next to the windows.

“Can’t be helped,” Erik said, as Jane came downstairs, yawning.

“Good morning,” she said. “What are you talking about?”

“Calling Albuquerque for Thor,” Erik said. “I can go to the drugstore.”

“You never go to the drugstore. Darcy always goes for you,” Jane said, frowning. “Won’t it draw attention?”

“That’s what I think,” Darcy said.

“So, Darcy should go. Thor and I worked out a code last night,” Jane said.

“Darcy?” Erik said, clearly alarmed.

“She’s the one who does all the errands, it makes sense,” Jane said. Erik looked at Darcy. Darcy turned her eyes up from the frying pan of eggs.

“I’ll go,” she said.

 

She memorized the code and then walked to the drugstore. She had a Coke float as if everything was normal and then went to the public telephone that was located in a little box at the front of the store. She asked for the number, rather than the field office by name, while she watched the street traffic. The operator transferred her smoothly. “Hello?” a brusque male voice said on the line.

“I’m calling from Puente Antiguo,” Darcy said. “It’s about Mjolnir.” She stumbled a little over the words.

“Mjolnir?” he said. “He’s alive?”

“Yes, sir,” she said. “We found your hammer in the desert. It’s got a few dents but we should be able to return it to you.”

“Can you bring him out to the desert?” the voice said. “Have another agent rendezvous with him at this location”--Darcy scribbled coordinates and stuffed the paper into her pocketbook--”on Thursday night?”

“Yes,” Darcy said, swallowing. As she stood there, one of Rumlow’s men walked by. O’Rourke. He stopped and walked towards her. “I’ve got to go,” Darcy whispered, hanging up. O’Rourke wrapped on the glass of the little phone alcove.

“Miss Lewis,” he said, grinning broadly. “I’m here to bring you something. Would you like a ride back to Selvig’s or some help with your errands?”

“Yes, thank you, Mr. O’Rourke,” Darcy stammered. “I’m just headed back. I--I was thinking of calling Mr. Rumlow, but then I realized I don’t have a number and, well--” she said.

“No need to be embarrassed,” O’Rourke said gently. “I’m sure he wouldn’t mind you calling, Miss. I can give you the number for the house.”

“Thank you,” Darcy said.

“It’s no trouble, don’t worry,” he said. He was a big, friendly-faced man, she thought. O’Rourke wrote down the number for her and drove her home, unloading a box of lemons and strawberries and a pound of sugar and carrying it into the house for her.  “Good for lemonade and icebox pie in this heat,” he said. Darcy smiled.

“Does Mr. Rumlow like ice box pie?” she asked, curious.

“Yes, miss,” O’Rourke said. “But he’ll eat anything you put in front of him. Rollins says he could eat his own shoes if he needed to, they had so little to eat when he was young.”

“Really? He doesn’t talk about that much,” Darcy said. He talked about his family in the present tense: his mother's gentle nature, the brothers that ran a store in California, his well-married sisters, and the one who still lived with him. There was no hint of hunger in any of his stories.

“I don’t want to speak out of turn, Miss, but his father died in an accident when he was, oh fifteen or so and it was hard going. All the kids worked, well not Frankie, she was just a baby then--”

“His sister that’s still at home?” Darcy said. O’Rourke’s face lit up.

“You’d like Frankie. Everybody likes Frankie, she’s a sharp one. She should write scripts for the pictures like that Miss Loos." His smile dimmed. "It's a pity her lungs are no good. Too many illnesses when she was little, she’s a chronic lunger. That’s why he came here, for Frankie and his Ma,” O’Rourke said. “Climate’s better for them than New York in the winter.”

“Oh,” Darcy said. She'd assumed he was from Chicago, not New York. 

 

When O'Rourke was gone, Jane came into the kitchen and looked at the crate. “We can’t have his men in and out of the house with Thor here,” she said, with an edge of panic. “Darcy, you have to stop going with him. Jilt him on Wednesday.”

“Jane, are you mad?” Erik said. “He’ll suspect something if she throws him over so quickly. She should wait awhile, then do it...” Darcy listened to them argue for a few minutes, then got her pocketbook.

“I need some air,” she said. They looked at her as if they’d forgotten she was there.

“Oh,” Jane said. "That's fine, just be careful."

“I’ll probably see a picture, too,” Darcy said. When she got to the movies, Darcy picked a seat off to the corner. She waited until the first reel of _The Street of Forgotten Men_ and then started to cry silently. No one would notice, she was sure. Who ever noticed her?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not crucial to the plot, but The Street of Forgotten Men sounds like a wild movie: http://silent-volume.blogspot.com/2012/03/street-of-forgotten-men-1925.html


	7. Carry A Torch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos on this weird little story. Seriously, every chapter gets a little...more odd. This is a Brock POV chapter.

“What’s bothering you?” Rumlow asked Darcy as he walked her home on Wednesday. She was too quiet, he thought.

“Nothing,” she said flatly. Impulsively, he reached over and threaded his fingers through hers.

“C’mon, you can tell me,” he said. He lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed it gently. She gave him a flickering, almost sad smile and shook her head. “You have a fight with Jane?” he asked. She froze and looked at him nervously.

“What makes you say that?” Darcy said.

“I got sisters, I know how you women can be,” Rumlow said teasingly. “Rosie and Frankie used to scream bloody murder at each other over who stole whose movie magazine, especially in hot weather.” They walked in silence for a minute. Her hand felt fragile in his.

“Jane, she just doesn’t--” Darcy began, then stopped.

“Doesn’t approve of you going out with a dago bootlegger?” Rumlow said. “Nice girl like you?” He tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice and failed. He was afraid she would shrink back, but to his surprise, she tucked herself under his shoulder for a minute, resting her cheek against his chest.

“Yeah,” Darcy whispered. “Doesn’t stop her from drinking your lemonade, though.” He was stunned to hear equal rancor in her voice.

“You mad on my behalf?” he asked, chuckling.

“Yes,” Darcy said. “I’m so mad I could spit tacks. So mad at the whole world.” Her voice quivered a bit and she blinked. “She ate some of my damn strawberries this morning.”

“I’ll get you more strawberries,” he promised.

“It’s the principle of the thing,” she said and he realized she was actually crying now.

“Hey, hey, it’s all right. You think I’m not used to it? I can take anything anybody says. Words don’t give me no trouble,” he said, rubbing her arm.

“Liar,” she whispered.

“Maybe a little,” he said, smiling. “Anything about me actually bother you? You object to my aftershave or my shoes?” Darcy stopped and looked up at him. Her blue were wide.

“You never take me parking,” she said.

“I’m trying for respectability here. You want to go parking?” he said, grin turning sly.

“It’d be nice to be asked,” she said, a note of petulance in her voice.

“All right,” he said, laughing.  He’d left the car at the drugstore with O’Rourke. “Let’s get the car, I’ll take you out for a drive.” He turned, still holding her hand.

 

Rumow leaned into the drugstore and called out to O’Rourke. “Call up to the ranch, get somebody to pick you up, I’m taking the car,” he said. Darcy was standing behind him, half-hidden by his shoulders.

“Yes, sir,” O’Rourke said, grinning. “Have a good night!”

“That public enough for you?” Rumlow asked her, as he opened the car door. “Half the town’ll know by midnight and the rest by sun up.”

“Yeah,” she said. She was smoothing her skirts as she sat. Those blue eyes flicked up to his and he wanted to kiss her in the street.

“You’re going to be the death of me,” he told her, taking off his coat. It was a warm night.

“What?” she said. A strange, troubled expression crossed her face.

“One of these nights, I’m going to have a heart attack when you aim those pretty eyes at me,” he said. “I am not a young man, Miss Lewis.”

“That I knew, Mr. Rumlow,” she said in a teasing voice. He rubbed her leg as they drove. He thought she might stop him, but instead, she leaned her head against his shoulder, getting close to him. He smiled at her.

“What else you do know about me, Miss Lewis?” he said.

“I’ve been told you like baseball, ice box pie, you smoke too much, and you’re trying to be good,” she said quietly.

“Not that good,” he said.

“Good enough,” she said.

 

He didn’t take her near the ranch. They’d yet to see hide or hair of Bodenson and he worried it wasn’t safe. Instead, he drove in the opposite direction of the stills and pulled off the road at a pretty enough spot. The juniper shrubs were silver green in the Ford’s headlights and the moon hung low. “Blood moon’s tomorrow night,” he said, turning off the car’s lamps. It was quiet.

“I know,” she said, lifting her head from his shoulder. He’d driven for a while, just to ease his nerves. He hadn’t expected this. Did she really want it? Rumlow looked at her.

“You sure?” he said. She seemed relaxed, almost sleepy.

“I’m sure,” Darcy said. She leaned up slowly and kissed him. Her mouth was incredibly soft and full. Shifting his body, he pulled her into his lap, cupping the back of her head. He felt the tension her body change at his touch. This time she was the one who was frantic and hungry in her kisses. Her nails scratched at his neck at she yanked at his collar. He pulled back, licking his lips.

“Let me,” he said. She’d never taken off a man’s tie before, he realized, grinning. He slid it loose and threw it in the backseat. She immediately started prying at his buttons, fingers pushing them through hastily as she kissed him. Chuckling, he sucked at her mouth and stilled the motion of her hands by pressing his tongue between her lips. He’d caught her full attention. Her fingers went flat against his chest, just holding on. When they separated, she looked faintly stunned again, flushed pink and wild eyed. She stared at him for a minute and then started on his buttons again. He seized her wrists gently. “I don’t want to hurt you or push you,” he whispered, puzzled by her urgency. “We’ve got all the time.” He nuzzled her face and she swallowed. “All the time,” he repeated and she nodded.

“Kiss me like that again,” she said. “I want things today, not tomorrow.” As soon as his mouth touched hers, she was pulling down his suspenders. His heartbeat thudded in his ears.

“Backseat,” he said, stripping off his shirt. They were laying in the backseat when he slid down her cami knickers. She had been touching him and kissing him, running her fingers all over his torso, but she paused when he touched her inner thighs gently. He breathed in and caught her gaze. Her expression was difficult to read in the moonlight. He leaned down and kissed her, wanting to make sure she was comfortable. Her fingers tangled in his hair.

“More,” she whispered. He nodded, reaching between her legs tentatively, stroking the dark thatch of hair. He kept kissing and touching her and she moaned against his mouth. Her breathing grew faster and he felt her shudder beneath him.

“You like parking, Miss Lewis?” he asked.

“Mmm-hmm,” she said. He kissed her forehead and lifted himself off her. His muscles were shaking. “Where you going?” she said, tilting her chin forward. Her hand reached for his arm as he breathed in and out slowly.

“Preserving your virtue,” he said.

“What?” she said. Darcy half sat up. “Why?”

“I’m an old man, I need a bed,” he lied, rubbing his jaw. “Besides, what about San Diego?”

“Mmm-hmm,” she said. He saw her swallow. He ran his palm down her leg.

“Or you could come to the house tonight?” he said, giving her a grin. To his surprise, she looked sad.

“Can’t. I have errands tomorrow,” she said.

“Pity,” he told her. He pulled her into his lap to hold her for a bit and help her back into her knickers. “I should take you home,” he said.

“No,” she told him. “I don’t wanna.” She kissed his neck, nuzzling him with an eagerness that felt strange. She was no fast girl and she was cold sober. Why was she so desperate for sensation? “Don’t make me go home,” she said, face against his jaw. “I can’t go home this soon.”

“Shh, I’m not making you go anywhere,” he said, stroking her neck. “You’re a funny egg, Darcy Lewis,” he teased.

“You think I’m funny?” she said, sounding oddly weepy.

“I think you’re a dream. Desperate to make time with me?” he said. He held her and kissed her until she fell asleep, then put her in the front seat with him and drove back into town. She woke up slowly.

“Brock?” she said, looking around in confusion. Her face fell when she realized where they were.

“You ought to get some sleep,” he told her gently, kissing her forehead. “You’re tired. What if we see each other tomorrow night?”

“I can’t,” she said. “Jane wants me to do work with her.”

“Oh,” he said. ”That’s too bad. Night after that then?”

“Yeah,” she said flatly, reaching for her handbag. Darcy gave him a sad look on the lawn. He watched her go back into Selvig’s house and tapped the Ford’s steering wheel. She was lying to him. Why?

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the purposes of this story, (i.e., making it closer to California and Mexico for smuggling purposes), Puente Antiguo = White Signal in southwestern NM, roughly between Las Cruces, NM and Tucson, AZ. Looks really beautiful, too: https://goo.gl/maps/ZcJ1LVnWLYA2
> 
> dago= early 1900s racial slur for an Italian-American, specifically, southern Italians and Sicilians (who were perceived as non-white, unlike northern Italians, and even sometimes the victims of mob violence/lynchings: https://www.pri.org/stories/2015-11-26/brief-history-america-s-hostility-previous-generation-mediterranean-migrants).
> 
> cami-knickers= underwear
> 
> make/making time= seeing someone


	8. Blood Moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos.

“Are you ready?” Darcy said to Jane. She had been pacing her room as they waited to take Odinson out to the desert to meet with another agent who would take him away--for now.

“Yes,” Jane said. But Darcy could see her hands shaking.

“I’ll pull the Model-T around back,” Darcy said. “Get the blankets to hide him in.”

“There’s no need to snap at me,” Jane said.

“Isn’t there?” Darcy said. “This is dangerous. We could get shot.”

“We won’t be,” Jane said.

“You can’t know that,” Darcy said. She left the room. Thor Odinson was waiting downstairs, talking to Eric. He straightened up when he saw her.

“Darcy, I want to thank you--” he began.

“I’m doing this for Jane. Stay under the blankets,” Darcy said. “And don’t try to shoot your way out again or you’ll have us all murdered.” She cranked the Model-T and drove it around to the back of Erik’s house. Erik had turned out all the lights. Jane came out first with blankets, then Thor emerged, hunched so he would look more like Erik, in a dark rain slicker and carrying Jane’s equipment. He climbed in and they covered him quickly. “Ready?” Darcy repeated.

“Yes,” Jane said.

 

They had been driving down the road outside of town when they spotted the roadblock. “Miss Lewis, Miss Foster,” Jack Rollins said, waving them down on the road. He leaned into the Model-T. “Mr. Rumlow wanted me to warn you. Be careful out tonight,” he said. “That blood moon might attract wildlife.”

“Coyotes?” Darcy said.

“Yes, miss,” he said. “Just be safe out there.” He tapped the window frame. “Here,” he said, handing her a gun. “Just so you’re armed.”

“Yes, Jack,” Darcy said politely, taking the gun carefully. “Tell Mr. Rumlow I look forward to seeing him soon.”

 

“You look forward to seeing him soon?” Jane said.

“I do. But be quiet,” Darcy said, getting the map out from under her seat.  She flicked on the flashlight.

“You haven’t jilted him?” Jane said. “I thought you were jilting him?”

“You were jilting him. I apparently have no say in the matter,” Darcy said. She made sure the gun wasn’t in her hand.

“What is wrong with you?” Jane said. In the backseat, Thor spoke.

“This is my fault,” he said.

“No--” Jane began.

“Yes, it is his fault. But it’s mostly your fault,” Darcy told Jane. “I’m angry with you. You take me for granted.” She clenched her fists, crumpling the map in her lap.

“Because I don’t want you involved with a murdering bootlegger?” Jane said.

“You don’t know,” Darcy said. “You’re just assuming that he shot those Prohis because he’s Italian! Just like everybody assumes he’s from Chicago or that he’s mad, but he’s not. He’s not! He’s perfectly sane and he wants me safe--”

“Tell her,” Jane said, gripping the steering wheel.

“I’m afraid his men shot those agents,” Thor said, sounding impossibly sad. “That’s why I was sent here.”

“No,” Darcy said. “That can’t be right--”

“They were supposed to be on his ranch, looking for the stills, just like me,” Thor said. “I am sorry, Darcy. I know he treats you well.”

“Stop the car,” Darcy said. “Stop the car!” She needed to get out. There was no air in here. She was burning up. She would choke. She needed to get out.

“Not here. We’re almost there,” Jane said.

 

She had to get out and walk when they stopped. Darcy wandered farther from Thor and Jane. They were waiting by the running car for the other agent to arrive. It seemed to take forever. Thirty minutes passed, then an hour. “Should we go?” Jane said. Thor shook his head.

“Five more minutes, then we go,” he said, cranking the Model-T.  Darcy thought it was a long shot. The agent had obviously stood them up. She walked, thinking about Rumlow and the dead agents. The blood moon glowed rusty red in the night sky. It was ominous-looking.

She was forty feet uphill when the gunshots began nearby and Jane screamed her name. Darcy turned, dropped to her knees, and looked over the edge of the incline. She knew there was no way she could make it down without being seen. There were cars some distance away, but their ligths were shining in her direction. Then Darcy heard a crash--the great crunching and tearing of metal that signified a car accident--and a renewed volley of gunfire. Some of the bullets seemed aimed in their direction. Jane and Thor were sheltering behind the Model-T. “Darcy!” Jane yelled. Thor had her gun, she realized.

“Go!” Darcy yelled. “Go! I’ll hide. Thor, make her go!”  She watched as Thor dragged a screaming Jane into the car and shoved her behind the wheel before they drove away. Jane was yelling and looking at her as they drove wildly, Thor holding the gun in the backseat. “Make it out,” Darcy murmured, “make it out.” The firing stopped and Darcy half-stumbled, half-slid down the hill, getting scratched and dirty along the way. Then it dawned on her: she could hear cars coming down the dirt road. Were Jane and Thor being pursued by the bootleggers? Only bootleggers and cops had that kind of ammunition. Darcy did the only thing she could think of to halt the car’s progress towards Jane. She stumbled to the edge of the road where the headlights would reveal her. The car’s driver slammed on its breaks. There was the sound of cursing, but Darcy barely heard it. Her heart had frozen in terror.

“Christ Almighty, Miss Lewis,” O’Rourke’s voice said, emerging from the car.

“Is she hurt?” someone else said.

“She’s bleeding,” O’Rourke said. “Christ, I’m dead. Christ.” He picked her up and carried her to the car.

“Whadda we do?” the other man said.

“We take her to the boss and beg for mercy,” O’Rourke said.

 

Rumlow’s face as O’Rourke carried her towards the house was a terrifying sight. His whole expression went dark. Darcy started to shake. “He’s not mad at you,” O’Rourke said softly. Rumlow came down and practically snatched her away from O’Rourke.

“Wait in the goddamned kitchen,” Rumlow said. He carried Darcy into the house. She was shaking in earnest now. Two women were sitting at the kitchen table. The older one stood, looking alarmed. The younger one raised an eyebrow.

“Well, what’s the hullaballoo?” she asked.

“Quiet, Frankie. She’s in shock,” Rumlow said. The older woman followed them to a bedroom. Brock said something to her that Darcy couldn’t understand. “Shhh, it’s okay, sweetheart,” he said. “We’re going to check you for injuries.”

“I fell. Jane, Jane,” she said.

“Where’s Jane?” he said

“We got separated. I told her to drive away,” Darcy said. “Don’t let anybody shoot her. Please. Please.”

“It’s okay--Mama, check her, I’ll be back.” She heard him running out to the yard and yelling something about Jane.

 

The older woman said soothing things to Darcy as she looked over her injuries, stripping away her torn and dirtied dress, stockings, and shoes. She was in her underclothes when Rumlow returned. His mother seemed to be scolding him, but he came directly to her side. “It’s all right, honey. Jack’s seen her. She’s driving into town now, she’s safe,” he said. “But you’ve got to stay here with me. It’s not safe to be outside tonight.” Darcy burst into tears of relief and he rocked her gently in his arms. Faintly, she heard his mother fussing, but then a voice spoke behind them.

“Knock it off, Mama. He wants to marry Miss Lewis, can’t you tell?” Frankie said, leaning against the doorway.

“She’s had a shock,” Brock said. “Goddammit, Frankie she almost died tonight!”

“I’m okay,” Darcy said in a strangled voice. “I’m--I’m crying because I’m relieved.”

“See?” Frankie said. “She’d probably also be relieved if you were less of a bum.” Rumlow half-turned to glare at his sister. His expression was so exasperated that Darcy actually started to laugh. She shrieked hysterically, leaning against Brock.

“O’Rourke--O’Rourke’s right, she should write for the movies,” Darcy said, still shaking. “Please don’t shoot him. I like him,” she told Rumlow.

“Get her a goddamned drink,” Rumlow said. “She’s hysterical.” Darcy was given a drink, a bath, and a change of nightclothes.

“Can I call Jane?” she asked, when Rumlow came to check on her. Frankie and his mother had apparently gone to their own rooms, but Darcy wondered if he’d made Frankie go. Rumlow kept looking at her intently.

“Yeah,” he said. He hovered as she got up--as if he expected her to collapse--and followed her to the phone. Jane answered on the first ring.

“Hello?” she said.

“It’s Darcy, I’m at Rumlow’s,” Darcy said quickly. “I’m okay, not hurt.”

“Oh thank God,” Jane said, breaking down. Darcy started to cry, too. “I was so worried--”

“Give me the phone,” Rumlow said softly. He pried it gently from her hand. “Jane?” he said. “Is everything okay there? She’s fine. I want her to stay overnight. We think those were Prohibition agents firing at some of my guys, so keep an eye out? You and Erik?” he said. He gave Darcy the phone back and she said goodnight to Jane. He walked her back to the guest bedroom and she climbed into bed. Darcy looked at Brock. He was pale and shaky-looking.

“Get in bed with me,” Darcy said, lifting the blankets.

“Now?” he said, baffled sounding. He was looking at her like she was mad.

“I could have died tonight,” she reminded him. His face looked wretched, but he crawled into bed with her, dropping a soft kiss on her cheek. Darcy wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him happily. She nibbled at the corner of his mouth and he swallowed. “Kiss me like you mean it,” she scolded. He dropped his forehead against hers.

“I love you,” he said.

“Show me,” Darcy whispered. “I want to know what it feels like,” she told him, hiking up her nightgown. “There’s a diaphragm in my purse.” He gaped at her for a moment, looking dazed.

“Yeah,” he said, blinking. “Yeah.”

It was difficult to make love quietly. The bed squeaked. Rumlow tucked his face against her shoulder to muffle his moans. Darcy gripped his hair and whispered in his ear. “I love you, too,” she said. He groaned into the pillow, body shuddering. When he’d collapsed next to her, she explored his body in the dark, running her hands all over him and planting kisses on his belly. He made little sounds of pleasure at her attentions.

“This is mad,” he said. “I’ve gone mad. Elope with me. We can leave tomorrow?”

“That soon?” Darcy said, momentarily surprised. She hadn’t taken Frankie seriously. “What about--what happened tonight? Could we leave so soon?”

“Probably not.” He sighed. “The day after tomorrow, we’ll go. Take the car. Get married in Tucson.”

“Yes,” Darcy said, caressing his thighs. He groaned.

 

 

In the morning, Brock woke up alone. “Darcy?” he said, looking around. The pillow still smelled of her perfume. He found his pants and dressed hurriedly. He went into the kitchen. “Ma, have you--” he began. Darcy was standing in the room with her back to him, stirring something in a bowl.

“She is making lemon pie,” his mother said, beaming. “For you. I go get eggs for pie and your breakfast.” She bustled out of the room. She loved her little henhouse and the red, fussy hens he'd bought her.

“Be careful, Mama,” Brock said.

“O’Rourke and Sweeney are outside, she won’t be alone,” Darcy said.

“Good,” he said, delighted by the sight of her in his kitchen. He felt intense relief. “I get pie?”

“Yeah,” Darcy said, shyly, looking over her shoulder. He came to stand behind her, rubbing her back.

“And that other thing we’re all pretending didn’t happen last night,” Frankie said, walking into the kitchen. 

“Frankie,” Rumlow scolded.

“Oil the beds,” Frankie grumbled. "We do a lot of pretending around here, don't we? I never realized until it was somebody new...Ain't that something?"

“Did you tell ‘em?” Rumlow asked Darcy. He ignored his sister's meditation on honesty.

“No,” Darcy said. “I thought that was your place. What if your mother is upset?” Her expression was worried.

“Why would she be upset that we’re getting married?” he asked.

“Phfffft,” Frankie said, suddenly. “She loves babies. Tell her you’re pregnant. She’ll think you hung the moon.”

“I do,” Brock said softly. “Think you hung the moon.”

“I’m not Catholic--or--” Darcy began, stumbling slightly over her words.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “Doesn’t matter to me at all.”

“Mama will have you baptized eventually,” Frankie said.

“Don’t scare her off,” Brock said. “Or you don’t get pie.”

“She gets pie,” Darcy said. “No matter what she says.”

“Thanks,” Frankie said, grinning. “I like her. You have my blessing.”

"Thank you," he said. He kissed the side of Darcy's face several times. She laughed, blushing.

"Stop, not in front of your sister!" Darcy said. 

"I wonder what other surprises we'll get?" Frankie wondered out loud. She put her feet on the table.

"Frankie," he scolded.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A blood moon:
> 
>  


	9. Rules and Prohibitions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

Darcy spent the rest of the day with the Rumlows. Her pie went into the icebox, they had breakfast, and Rumlow dragged her into the guest bedroom on a pretext while his mother was knitting. “I know Frankie didn’t leave a magazine in here,” Darcy said breathlessly. He was lifting her skirt with eager fingers. “We can’t--your mother will hear,” she told him.

“We’re getting married tomorrow,” he said. Darcy looked into his eyes and melted. Those soft brown eyes were looking at her tenderly. Sweetly. A thought rose in Darcy’s mind, but she pushed it away. It was impossible that he could kill anyone. He was the gentlest person that she knew. He dropped to his knees. “You make me very happy, Miss Lewis,” he said. She arched her body in response to his mouth. Frankie snickered when they stumbled out of the bedroom twenty minutes later, both guilty-faced. His mother seemed not to notice. A few minutes later, Mrs. Rumlow got up and said something to her son. They left the room.

“What was that?” Darcy asked.

“I think I am forbidden to tell,” Frankie said. They brought a trunk into Darcy’s room.

“Mama wants you to have this,” Rumlow told her. Mrs. Rumlow opened it and lifted out a sheet of lace.

“Good lace,” his mother said. “Wedding veil. For you. For tomorrow.”

“You want me to wear it?” Darcy said. She started to weep when his mother smiled at her. Rumlow kissed her forehead. It was a sunny, beautiful day, full of a kind of bright promise. When dusk fell, Darcy was ready to be married in the morning. There had been no activity on the mesa.

 

They were having her icebox pie when the phone rang. He got it. “Sweetheart,” he said, “it’s Jane for you?”

“Hello?” Darcy said, putting the phone close to her ear.

“Darcy, you have to leave. The Prohis are raiding the ranch. Tonight. You have to leave---” Jane said. “Do you hear me? Darcy?”  Darcy hung up the phone without replying. She started to weep and then slid down slowly onto the kitchen floor.

“Darcy?” Rumlow said, rushing to her side. “What’s wrong?”

“Federal Prohibition agents are coming tonight. We’ve been hiding one of them at Erik’s,” Darcy said flatly. He drew back as if she’d slapped him, then grabbed her shoulders.

“What are you saying to me?” he said. “What are you saying?!” Frankie and Mrs. Rumlow appeared in the doorway, drawn to the sound of his voice.

“We found him on the mesa one night. His name is Odinson, not Bodenson,” she said, a tear sliding down her face. “Jane’s in love with him, you see? She’s never--she’s never been in love before. I couldn’t take that away from her when I knew how--how it felt to fall in love.” He looked at her for a moment that seemed to stretch on forever. She felt as if her entire life happened in a moment. He leaned forward. He kissed her forehead.

“I understand,” he said. He said something to his mother and sister in what she assumed was Italian, head half-turned towards them. Then he turned back to Darcy and clasped her face between his hands. “I love you,” he said. “That’s all that matters.” Then he got up and grabbed the phone, making calls and distributing orders to his men. To his mother and sister he said, “Don’t worry about everything, just bring your photographs, Mama. You understand?” A grim-faced Frankie nodded. Rumlow went outside. Darcy sat on the floor and wept for several minutes, then struggled to her feet. She found the other two women throwing things into a trunk.

“Can I help?” Darcy offered. Outside, the men were moving the liquor.

 

They loaded up a trunk with a few meager, but obviously precious things--the lace veil, photos, a Bible--while Mrs. Rumlow sobbed openly. “It’s okay, Mama,” Frankie said. “We’ll replace everything.” The older woman shook her head, weeping. She kept touching the furnishings and the lamps and dishes. Frankie tried to lead her outside to a car, but she resisted. Finally, Mrs. Rumlow burst out in English.

“Some things cannot be replaced!” she said. “You can never replace them!” Rumlow appeared in the doorway.

“C’mon, Mama,” he said gently. “You have to go. You’re going to Las Cruces and I’ll meet you, all right?”

“No, no, no,” she said. She was shaking her head. Frankie looked helplessly at her brother.

“Boss,” O’Rourke said behind him, “We gotta hurry. Callahan,” he said. Rumlow’s face went tight and dark again. His jaw worked.

“Everyone come on,” he barked. The two woman followed him out as he and O’Rourke carried the trunk. They put it in a car. “O’Rourke will take you,” he said. “Okay?” He kissed his mother and his sister, looking at them intently. “I’ll see you soon,” Rumlow said. He turned to Darcy. “C’mon, sweetheart,” he said. She shook her head. “Get in the car,” he said. She was still standing on the porch. He moved quickly to her side and put his hands on her shoulders. “Nothing’s changed, sweetheart. We’re still getting married,” he told her earnestly. “You’ll see Jane again.”

“Did your men kill those Prohis?” she asked quietly, in a voice too low to be overheard. He looked at her. His eyes were darker in the shadow of the porch.

“I’ve done things I’m not proud of,” he said. He had, she realized. It was written across his face.

“I can’t,” she told him.

“Yes, you can,” he said. The fingers on her shoulders tightened. It was painful. Darcy started to cry and shook her head.

“No,” she said. “I can’t go.”

“Yes, Darcy,” he said.

“Boss,” O’Rourke said, his voice a warning. Dimly, Darcy could hear Frankie crying.

“Go without me,” Darcy called out. Rumlow half-turned his head and nodded. O’Rourke shut the car door, got in, and drove away. Rumlow held her in his arms for a moment. “You, too,” Darcy said, gently prying herself out of his embrace. “Go, quick.”

“No,’ he said. One of the other men came and tried to drag him into a second car, loaded with liquor. It took three of them. His eyes never stopped watching her, even as they pulled him away.

 

Alone, Darcy sat on the porch steps. The Prohis showed up forty minutes later. Multiple cars, filled with men, poured out. “Where is he?” one yelled.

“Gone,” Darcy said. “Left this morning,” she lied. They stormed the house and the land. But they found only some barrels and stills, not guilty men. Soon, the air was filled with curses. Thor and the agent in charge, Agent Purdue, started to bicker about the routes he could have taken. Darcy kept quiet.

“It’s obvious, ain’t it?” the older man said. “Your sweetheart’s friend tipped him off!”

“No,” Thor said. “We hadn’t even gotten approval from the director this morning.” They continued to argue. Darcy drifted inside to discover that the other agents were destroying all of Mrs. Rumlow’s things. A salt shaker lay in the middle of her half-eaten lemon pie.

“Look,” one of the agents said. He dropped a cake plate on the floor with a cruel laugh. Another agent copied him. It was awful. They sounded oddly animalistic to her, smashing and rending.

“Stop!” Darcy yelled. “Stop it!” She didn’t see Purdue and Thor had entered until Purdue grabbed her arm and yanked her around to face him.

“Shut up, you little bootlegger’s whore,” Purdue said. “Where he go?”

“I don’t know!” Darcy said. She had never been slapped before, so it took her by surprise when Purdue slapped her hard across the face. Her teeth rattled and for a moment, she was stunned and terrified.

“Stop,” Thor said, putting himself between her and his superior officer.

“Going out of your way for some dago’s slut, Odinson? This’ll go in the report,” Purdue said venomously.

“Fine,” Thor said, still shielding Darcy. He took her out and put her in a car while she wept. The smashing of crockery and furniture rang in Darcy’s ears. “Go home to Jane and Erik,” Thor said.

“Home,” Darcy repeated numbly. He handed her the car keys.

***

 

Thor was in all the newspapers as the golden boy agent, heroically saved by Jane, lady scientist. A sensationalized version of events had been fed to reporters. Darcy suspected it came from an eager neighbor, bribed by the reporters who came to cover the raid. The couple were practically overnight celebrities. Darcy read all the papers for mentions of bootleggers and rum runners. She studied bootleggers from New York with particular attention and looked for mentions of mothers and sisters. That was when Darcy discovered that O’Rourke’s Callahan was probably an upstate bootlegger named Frank Callahan. Federal agents had raided his home several weeks before. A half-mile away, they’d seen a car they thought was his and filled with it lead. His mother and wife had been inside. There was no liquor in the car, just bits and pieces of two now-dead women. She read all the news reports: bootleggers shot, bootleggers in car crashes, bootleggers who disappeared and were never seen again. Darcy didn’t hear from Rumlow.

It occurred to her, after reports of one particularly bad police chase and crash near Triskelion, California, where several bootleggers were killed, that she didn't even know his actual name. Any one--or none of them at all--could be him and she wouldn't know. Unless someone wrote to tell her. She couldn’t talk to Jane about it, so she went to the drugstore and sat in silence, bypassing the reporters lingering around the barbershop, collecting gossip. “Are you going to be all right?” Phil Coulson asked her softly.

“Probably,” Darcy said. “We’re staying in town while Jane finishes her research. Then she and Thor are going to be married.” 

 

After two weeks, all the attention died down. The reporters went away, the agents went off to other assignments, and Darcy and Jane returned to the desert to do observations. It was very quiet in the dark. Thor was waiting to be told where he would go. Darcy knew from Erik’s glances that there had been some tension from Washington. One morning, she woke to the sound of raised voices in Jane’s room and Thor’s heavy footsteps on the stairs, Jane on his heels. “How can you just leave?” Jane cried. “We--we were supposed to be married!” Her voice echoed in the house.

“We will be,” Darcy heard Thor say. “Soon. Jane, I promise. As soon as this assignment is over.” Darcy heard Jane burst into tears and them move into Jane’s room, whispering urgently.

 

She got up and went downstairs. Erik was drinking coffee. He looked old and tired. Darcy raised an eyebrow. “Telegram came today. Apparently, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation gets real jealous when an agent gets attention,” Erik said. Darcy nodded.

“And helps out a bootlegger’s girl?” she asked.

“Who knows what men and Washington think and do?” Erik said, with a kind of macabre grimness. He was finishing off the last of Rumlow’s good whiskey.

“Where are they sending him?”

“Northern California.” Darcy nodded and got up to visit the drugstore again. They would have a newspaper. She could check for telegrams or phone calls. She stopped in the doorway and looked back at Erik. “I’m sorry, Darcy,” he said.

“What was it all for?” Darcy wondered aloud. ”In the grand scheme of things?”

“The laws and customs of the United States?” Erik offered bitterly. She went to the drugstore, came back empty handed, said good luck to Thor, and held a weeping Jane.

“When will he come back?” Jane said out loud.

“Soon,” Darcy said. “Shhh, it’ll be okay. Soon.”

“I was an idiot,” she said. “How can you stand me?”

“I loved you even when I didn’t like you much,” Darcy said.

 

 

By summer, Darcy stopped waiting for a phone call. Stopped looking for telegrams and letters. Jane wanted to lecture at a university, so off they went. “Goodbye, Phil,” she told Coulson at the drugstore. Erik had taken a liking to the nameless dog and refused to part with him, so they would stay in town.

“Where are you headed?” he asked.

“Virginia and other places, courtesy of Jane Foster,” Darcy said.

“I’ll pass it on, if anyone comes asking,” he said. Darcy nodded.

“Thank you,” she said softly. “But I don’t think it will be necessary.”

“You never know. You take care now,” he said.  She was in the kitchen with Jane one day before their departure when their was a rapid knock on the door. It rattled on its hinges.

"Miss Lewis?" a voice called. It was one of the boys from the drugstore who'd knocked. He looked out of breath. “Miss Lewis,” he said, panting, “Mr. Coulson said there’s a call for you at the drugstore. I ran all the way. He says it’s urgent.” Darcy looked at Jane.

“I’m going,” she said, taking off her apron.

“I want you to go,” Jane said softly, taking it from her.

 

When she picked up the phone, she could hear someone wheezing softly on the other end. “Hello?” Darcy said. “Miss Lewis speaking.” The voice on the other end sighed.

“It’s good to hear you, sweetheart,” he said. Darcy’s heart stuttered.

“Are you all right?” she whispered. “I worried, when I didn’t hear--”

“They tell me I’ll live,” he said, “but I can’t come back for you. You wouldn’t want me in the state I’m in, anyway.”

“That’s not true. I don’t care about your business. I don’t care if you’re”--she lowered her voice--”in jail. It doesn’t matter,” she said. ”We can make do. I’ll wait.”

“Don’t wait for me. I’m not coming back,” he said.

 

She looked at the phone for a long time after he’d disconnected the call.

 

 

***

 

**The Atlantic, 1927**

“I’ve never met anyone like you, Miss Lewis,” he said. They were leaning against the railing of the ocean liner, looking at the sea in the moonlight. The Atlantic crossing had been without storms or disruptions, but Darcy had been dreading this eventuality. A romantic proposal loomed on the horizon, she thought grimly.

“Thank you, Mr. Boothby,” she said with cold politeness. As if by rote.

“Ever since we met in London, I’ve felt--I’ve felt the greatest admiration of my life,” Boothby said earnestly. “Your liveliness, your charm, they--”

“I appreciate your sentiment,” Darcy said, cutting him off. “But I’m afraid I’ll need to go back to my room. Miss Foster requires my assistance.”

“May I walk you back?” he asked.

“It isn’t necessary,” Darcy said. “Goodnight, Mr. Boothby. Enjoy your trip.”

“Goodnight, Miss Lewis,” he said, deflating slightly. He’d intended to propose. But she seemed indifferent to his attentions, despite his best efforts.

 

“Have you rebuffed Ian? I had to get away from those women asking whether I’d leave it all behind for motherhood one day,” Jane asked, when Darcy entered their suite on the ocean liner. Jane had become quite famous as a scientific expert. They’d gone to Europe for her to lecture.

“I think so,” Darcy said. “Did you want to leave it all behind for motherhood?” Jane was putting cold cream on her face at the vanity.

“God help me if I did. Why is it that neither of us has all that much luck with the masculine of the species?” Jane said archly. There was something painful in her face.

“Has he telegraphed?” Darcy asked. Jane and Thor’s engagement had lasted two long years, largely by correspondence. They never seemed to be in the same place. His job meant Thor still chased bootleggers and criminals, while Jane lectured at universities, wrote, and even appeared on the radio. Some outlets had refused to run her speeches, however. Darcy had been in a Maryland room one night, when she turned on the radio, expecting Jane’s pleasant, intelligent voice. She had wept when heard the Reverend Tillis’s old lecture on submissive wives. It reminded her too viscerally of New Mexico and all she’d lost.

“He says he’ll meet us in New York,” Jane said, breaking Darcy’s train of thought about the smell of juniper and brown eyes. Jane had accepted a job working for Tony Stark. Her own lab, her own equipment, everything she’d ever wanted. Except Thor.

“I hope he does,” Darcy said softly. To her surprise, Jane started to weep. She looked at Darcy in the mirror.

“What if he never does?” she said. “What if I keep waiting and--and it just never happens?”

“He will,” Darcy said.

 

When they docked in New York, Jane was so nervous she was shaking. Darcy helped carry her hatbox and hid from Ian Boothby in a cluster of tourists from Delaware. They were descending the gangplank when it happened. A golden head appeared in the crowd, taller than everyone else. He waved his hat. “Jane! Jane!” he called out.

“See?” Darcy said. “I told you.” Beside her, Jane had started to cry. Then she ran down the gangplank and into his arms. Darcy watched for a moment as they hugged. Thor swung Jane off her feet and Darcy blinked back tears. She was happy for Jane. Truly.

“True love?” someone said at Darcy’s elbow. “Miss Lewis?” Darcy looked over, surprised.

“I think so. Do we know each other?” she asked.

“Not precisely. Happy Hogan, miss, here to chauffeur you to your new lab,” he said, smiling politely.

“Let’s give the lovebirds their moment?” Darcy said.

“Good idea,” he said.

“How long have you worked for Mr. Stark?” she asked.

“It feels like forever,” he said. “Sometimes, I think I ought to branch out a little, do more than drive.”

“Like what?” Darcy asked.

“Something more meaningful,” he said. She nodded. It was a familiar feeling.

 

 -The End-


End file.
